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SPIRITUALISM 



IDENTICAL WITH 



ANCIENT SOECBRY, NEW TESTAMENT DEMONOLOGY, 
AND MODERN WITCHCRAFT: 



WITH THE TESTIMONT OP GOD AND MAN 
AGAINST IT. 



By W. M'DONALD. 



►♦^ 



PUBLISHED BY CARLTON & POBTER, 



200 MULBKERY-8TLEET. 

1866. 






Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1866, 
By CARLTON & PORTER, 

in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for 
the Southern District of New- York. 



PEEFACE. 



-♦♦♦■ 



The author of this volume was appointed, b;^ 
the "Proyidence District Ministers' Associa- 
tion," to prepare an essay on the " History of 
Spiritualism." Two years subsequent to the 
appointment the essay was read before the As- 
sociation, when the following resolution was 
passed with regard to its publication : 

"Besolved, That Eev. W. M'Donald be re- 
spectfuUy requested to enlarge and publish, in 
book form, his essay on the History of Spirit- 
ualism, read before this Association, and that 
we hereby pledge ourselves to use our efforts to 
give circulation to said book." 

The essay was subsequently read, by request, 
before an association of clergymen at Bridge- 
water, Mass., when the following resolution was 
passed : 



4: PREFACE. 

" Hesolved^ That the thanks of this Associa- 
tion be tendered to Eev. W. M'Donald for his 
very able essay on the History of Spiritualism, 
and we concur with the Providence District 
Association in requesting its publication." 

The essay has been enlarged to about four 
times its original size, thereby adding very much 
to the value of the book. 

Our object has been, mainly, to prove that 
modern Spiritualism, claiming to be a ''N^ew 
Disjpensation^'^ is older than Christianity. It 
has generally appeared in connection with some 
remarkable religious movement, and always in 
conflict with it 

If Spiritualism be the work of spirits, they 
are such spirits or demons as the Greek and Eo- 
man sorcerers evoked ; such as possessed the man 
among the tombs in the country of the Gada- 
renes ; such as possessed the damsel who troubled 
Paul and Silas at Philippi ; such as were present 
in the witchcraft of Europe and America. 

If Spiritualism be the action of odylic forpe^^ 
as claimed by Rogers, Mahan, and others ; or if 



PKEFACE. 5 

it be an intermediate agent between spirit and 
matter, nearly answering to odylic force, as 
claimed by Dr. Samson ; or if it be mere sleiglit 
of band, deception, bumbuggery, as claimed by 
Professor Mattison and those who think with 
him, then this odylic force, intermediate agent, 
sleight of hand, or bumbuggery has produced in 
the past all the phenomena of modern Spirit- 
ualism. 

We are frank to confess that we believe Spirit- 
ualism to be, in part at least, the work of de- 
mons ; and that Paul accurately describes them 
in 1 Tim. iv, 1 : " Now the Spirit speaketh ex- 
pressly, that in the latter times some shall de- 
part from the faith, giving heed to seducing 
spirits and doctrines of devils." This conclusion 
cannot be avoided if we have succeeded in prov- 
ing that New Testament demonology and Greek 
and Roman sorcery are identical. Of this the 
reader must judge. But this is not the point 
which we have labored to establish in these 
pages. Whether it be the one or the othei* 4^68 
uot affect our argument. 



6 PEEFACE. 

Many of the facts liere presented will be new 
to a large class of readers ; and as a book of 
reference on the " History of Spiritualism/' an- 
cient and modern, it will be found valuable. 

The chapter on the " Fruits of Spiritualism " 
is a very dark picture. We have simply per- 
mitted spiritualists, and those who have aban- 
doned it, to speak for themselves. 

It has cost us no small amount of labor to 
collect and arrange the materials for this vol- 
ume. "We could have written a much larger 
book with less labor. 

Among the works which we have consulted, 
and from which we have received valuable aid, 
are the following : 

The Bible. 

Works of Joseplius. 

Clarke's, Scott's, Barnes's, Bush's, and Olshausen's Notes 
and Commentaries. 

Brown's, Calmet's, Buck's, Watson's, and Kitto's Bib- 
lical and Theological Dictionaries. 

Rollin's Ancient History, 

E^aebius's Ecclesiastical History. 



PEEFACE. 7 

Du Pin's Ecclesiastical History. 

"Works of Dr. Dick. 

Works of Dr. Stackhouse. 

Works of Dr. Lardner. 

Works of Dr. Lee. 

Anthon's Classical Dictionary. 

Arminian Magazine. 

Encyclopedia Americana. 

Wesley Family, by Dr. Adam Clarke. 

Southey's Life of Wesley. 

Witchcraft and Demonology, by Sir Walter Scott. 

Magnalia Christi- Americana, by Cotton Mather, Lon- 
don, 1702. 

Wonders of the Inyisible World, by Cotton Mather, 
London, 1693. 

More Wonders of the Livisible World, by Eobert Calef, 
London, 1700. 

History of Witchcraft, by Francis Hutchinson, D.D., 
London, 1718. 

Massachusetts Historical Collections. 

History of Magic, by Ennemoser, London. 

Salem Witchcraft, by J. Thatcher. 

Salem Witchcraft, by C, Upham. 

London Retrospective Review. 

Westminster Review. 

Domestic Annals of Scotland, by Chambers. 



8 PREFACE. 

Footfalls on tlie Boundaries of Another World, by 
Robert Dale Owen. 

Spiritualism Tested, by George W. Samson, D.D. 

Spirit Manifestations, by Rev. Charles Beecber. 

Spirit Rappings, by Rev. J. Porter, D.D. 

Ancient Sorcery Revived in Modem Spiritualism, by 
Rev. C. Munger. 

Modem Mysteries Explained and Exposed, by Presi- 
dent Mahan, 

Modern Spiritualism, its Truths and its Errors, by Rev. 
T. L. Harris. 

Spiritualism, Vols. I, II, by Judge Edmonds and Dr. 
Dexter. 

Spiritualism Scientifically Demonstrated, by Robert 
Hare, M.D. 

Rise and Progress of the Mysterious Noises in "Western 
New York, by E. W. Capron and H. D. Bairon. 

The New Testament, as Corrected by the Spirits. 

Ministry of Angels Realized, by Mr. and Mrs. Newton, 

Spirit Works, Real but not Miraculous, by Allen Put- 
nam. 

Discussion of Modem Spiritualism, by Professor J. S. 
Grimes and Leo Miller, Esq. 

Histoi-y of the Supernatural, by W. Hpwitt. 

Spiritual Telegraph. 

Banner of Light. 



PREFACE. 9 

We have had an opportunity of witnessing the 
phenomena of Spiritualism. 

That this little volume may lead some soul, 

blinded by the God of this world, to Him who 

was revealed to destroy the works of the devil, 

and save many from falling who are halting 

between two opinions, is the earnest prayer of 

the author. 

W. M'DONALD. 



CONTENTS 



-^^^ 



CHAPTER I. 

SPIBITUALISM. 

Hydesville Rappings — Dr. Hare — Mediums — Rapping, Tip- 
ping, etc. — Tables — Chairs — Piano-fortes — Guitars — House- 
bells — Clothing — Persons held and thrown down — Dr. Hare 
at Cape May — Writing — Speaking — New Dispensation — 
Its Theology Page 15 

CHAPTER n. 

ANCIENT SORCERY. 

Terms employed and defined — Oracle of Trophonius — 
Oracle of Claros — Oracle of Apollo — Mediums — Poetical Me- 
diums — Prophetic Mediums — Sealed Letters — Croesus — Tra- 
jan — Jamblicus — Sibylline Oracles — Du Pin — Justin Mar- 
tyr — Speaking Mediums — Healing Mediums — Temple of 
jEsculapius — Temple to Hygeia — Writing Mediums — Cir- 
cles — Cicero ~ -^neas — Pliny — Apion — Achilles — Basic 
Fact of Spiritualism 31 



12 CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER in. 

NEW TESTAMENT DEMONOLOGY. 

Diabolos — Satanas — Daimon — Diamonion — Personified 
Principles of Evil — Personal Enemies — Diseases — Gamp- 
bell — Lee — Damsel at Philippi — Kitto — Josephus — Lard- 
ner — ApoUo — Simon Magus — Justin Martyr — Olshau- 
sen Page 54 

CHAPTER IV. 

MODEBN WITCHCRAFT. 

"Witchcraft on the Continent — Germany — University of 
Paris — Norbonne — Pope John XXII. — Sjniod of Langress — 
Bull of Pope Innocent YIII. — Florimond — Number of Witch- 
es executed on the Continent — Joan of Arc — Sorcery in En- 
gland and Scotland — Bishop Jewell — Laws of England — 
Numbers executed in England — Edmond Hartley — Laws of 
Scotland — Dr. Dick — Females — Bullingbrook — Maid of 
Kent — Miss Throgmorton — Meikle John Gibb — Mediums — 
Pordage and his Society of Angelic Brethren — Jane Lead — 
Revelations — Daughter of a Protestant Clergyman — Peter 
Apon — Blind Conjurer of Paris — Surrey Demoniac — Musical 
Mediums — Nuns of Loudou — Agnes Sympson — Bessie Dun- 
lop and Thomas Reid — Alison Pearson and WiUiam Symp- 
son — Compared with Spiritualism 75 

CHAPTER V. 

SALEM WITCHCBAFT. 

When commenced — Dr. Bently — Judge Story — Boston — 
Springfield, etc. — Rev. Mr. Parris's Children -— Witehee — 



CONTENTS. 18 

Fast — The Court — Numbers accused — Nurabers executed — 
The Reaction — Confession of Judges — Rev. Mr. Parris com- 
pelled to retire — Robert Calif's Book — Cotton and Increase 
Mather — Phenomena of "Witchcraft — Ann Cole — William 
Morse — G-eorge Watson — Philip Smith — Children of John 
Goodwin — Thomas Brattle's Letter to the Salem Gentlemen — 
Mediums — Thatcher — Hutchinson — Dr. Sampson ■ — Cotton 
Mather — Witchcraft compared with Spiritualism .... Page 95 

CHAPTER YI 

THE SPIRIT OF MASCON Am> EPWORTH RAPPINGS. 

Rev. Mr. Perreaud — Synod at Bussy — Noises commence — 
Curtain drawn — Pewter and Brass thrown about the Kitchen 

— Mr. Perreaud returns — Noises — Elders and others called 
in — "Voice heard — Language used — Relates secret Matters — 
Mocks God — Tumbles the Bed — Music — Throwing Stones — 
Bishop of Mascon — Rev. J. Wesley — Robert Boyle — Rev. 
Peter du Molin — Epworth Rappings — Rev. S. Wesley — 
Klnockings — Prayer for the King — Wesley thrice pushed — 
Rev. Mr. Hoole called in — Children disturbed while asleep — 
Dog affected — Footsteps heard — Groans — Trencher dances — 
Dr. Priestley— Mr. Southey — Coleridge — Dr. Adam Clarke — 
Spiritualism and Revivals of Religion 113 

CHAPTER Vn. 

god's TESTIMONT AGAmST SPIRITUALISM. 

Rev. C. Munger — Divine Law — Sin of Babylon — - Sin 
of Manasseh — Sin of Saul — Witch — Samuel — Rebellion 

— New Testament Law — Dr. Hare — Who consulted 
Spirits? 141 



14 COISTTENTS. 

CHAPTER Vm. 

FRUrrS OF MODERN SPIRITUALISM, 

Spiritualistic Yiew of Revelation — Rev. T. L. Harris on Spir- 
itualism — Sin — Dr. Hare — Lizzy Doten — Banner of Light — 
Christ — Banner of Light — Emma Harding — No Redeemer in 
the Spiritualist's Heaven — St. Stephen — St. John — Hell — 
Emma Harding — Lizzy Doten — Rich Man — Invocation to the 
Prince of Darkness — Invocation to Lucifer — Pagan Devil-wor- 
ship — Marriage — Banner of Light Page 158 

CHAPTER rX. 

TESTIMONY AGAINST SPIRITUALISM, 

W. Fishbough — W. B. Coan— B. F. Hatch, M.D. — J. P. 
Whiting — Cora L. Y. Hatch —Wise Man's Counsel 191 



SPIEITUALISM, 



CHAPTEE L 

SPIRITUALISM. 

A BRIEF description of modem spiritualism 
in its history y mediums^ phenomena^ and theology ^ 
wUl aid US in our investigation of its general 
history. We shall be able the more readily to 
identify its present with its former phenomena. 

In 1848 there Hyed in Hydesville, near 
Rochester, New York, a farmer by the name 
of* John D. Fox. Mr. and Mrs. Fox were 
the parents of six children, the two youngest 
only — ^Margaret and Kate — ^living at home; 
the former fifteen, and the latter twelve years 
of age. 

The house into which the family had recently 
removed was soon disturbed by noises, supposed 



16 SPIRITUALISM. 

to proceed from rats and mice. These noises, 
at first somewhat confused, were soon observed 
to be slight, but distinct knockings, in and 
abont the bed-room, which gradually became 
louder and more general. The children were 
disturbed in bed by something resembling a 
dog lying on their feet, and a cold hand felt 
on Kate's face. Bedclothes were frequently 
pulled from the bed, chairs and tables removed 
from their places, and, in short, there was a 
general disarrangement of household matters. 

Every effort was made by Mr. and Mrs. 
Fox to discover the cause of these strange dis- 
turbances, but without any satisfactory results. 

On the night of March 31st, 1848, the 
parents and children lodged in the same 
room. At an early hour the rappings com- 
menced with unusual violence. Thinking the 
noise might proceed from the rattling of the sash- 
es, it being a windy night, Mr. Fox tried them, 
but found them all secure. Kate observed 
that when he shook the sashes, the noises re- 
sponded; and turning in the direction from 



SPIEITUALISM. 17 

which the sounds proceeded, snapped her 
finger, and exclaimed, " Here, old Splitfoot, 
do as I do." The kaockings instantly re- 
sponded. 

These manifestations of apparent intelligence 
so alarmed the girls that they desisted for a 
time from trying any more experiments. 

3frs. Fox seemed anxious to go further, and 
did so. She soon learned the ages of her 
children, and something of the history of the 
spirit which communicated with her. His 
name was Charles B. Rosma, a married man, 
the father of five children, and thirty-one years 
old. He had been murdered there some years 
before by one John C. Bell, a blacksmith, and 
his remains buried in the cellar of the house, 
at a depth of ten feet. This intelligence pro- 
duced unheard-of excitement in the town, and 
the people flocked from all parts to hear and 
see. Excavations were made in the cellar at 
different times, as the water would allow. At 
the depth of five feet they found plank : further 

on, pieces of crockery, charcoal, and quick lime j 

2 



18 SPIRITUALISM. 

then human hair, and bones said by anatomists 
to have been portions of a human skeleton. 

These are among the alleged facts connected 
with this case. There were many contra- 
dictory statements made, but it does not come 
within our province to examine them in this 
brief treatise. 

The rappings were not confined to the Fox 
residence, but were soon heard in other houses 
in the neighborhood ; and not long after they 
appeared in Eochester, and the adjoining towns 
and cities ; and now we find them everywhere. 

In this simple manner commenced what are 
known as the "Rochester Knockings." 

Dr. Hare says he inquired of his " spirit- 
father^^ why these manifestations were first 
made at Hydesville, through the spirit of a 
murdered man? and his father informed him 
that Hydesville was chosen because of the 
ignorance of the people, and the spirit of a 
murdered man was employed because that would 
excite more interest. (Spiritualism Scientific- 
ally Demonstrated, p. 85.) 



SPIRITUALISM. 19 

Here is tlie origin of modern medimnsliip ; 
and it is wonderful witli what rapidity mediums 
have multiplied since Kate Fox first intro- 
duced herself to " old SpUtfoot " at Hydes- 
ville, in 1848. 

The mediums of modern spiritualism may 
be classified as follows: 

1. Bapping Mediums^ who produce distinct 
sounds by the aid of unseen agents. 

2. Tipping Mediums^ who move tables, and 
household furnitm^e generally, with all kinds 
of material substances. 

3. Spedkvag Mediums^ who pronounce dis- 
courses, under the inspiration, professedly, of 
departed spirits, equal in all respects, if not 
superior, as they claim, to any ever pronounced 
by mortals. 

4. Seeing Mediums^ who claim to be able 
to clearly see and accurately describe invisible 
spirits. 

5. Drawing Mediums ^"^^lo furnish drawings of 
leaves, vines, fruit and fiowers of the spirit-land, 
which cannot be classified by human botanists. 



20 SPIRITUALISM. 

6. Painting Mediums^ who in thirty minutes, 
it is said, can famish full-length portraits of 
persons long since dead ; which, in point of 
artistic skill, equals Michael Angelo, Correggio, 
Raphael, or Titian. 

7. Musical Mediums^ who discourse exquisite 
music on piano-fortes, guitars, and, in fact, all 
kinds of instruments, without the aid of fleshly 
fingers. 

8. Singing Mediums^ whose vocal perform- 
ances are quite up to Jenny Lind. 

9. Dancing Mediums^ whose performances in 
this department throw Ellen Tree, Fanny EUs- 
ler, or the most accomplished French dancing- 
master entirely into the shade. 

10. Writing Mediums^ who are filling the 
land with volumes dictated by departed spirits. 

11. Healing Mediimis^ who claim to cure the 
most obstinate diseases by prescriptions fur- 
nished by the departed. These prescriptions 
are said to produce wonders, of which the " wa- 
ters of Israel " and " balm of Gilead '' could 
never boast. 



SPIRITUALISM. 21 

12. JDeveloping Mediums^ whose operations 
are a little obscure, and hence not so easily de- 
scribed. 

These are the more prominent mediums of 
Spiritualism, ifrom which the extent of medium- 
ship among them may be learned. 

The general facts of Spiritualism are so well 
attested, that few persons are found, whatever 
their opinion of the phenomena, who are willing 
to risk their reputation for candor on an unquali- 
fied denial of them. There may be a difference 
of opinion as to the force or agent by which 
these phenomena are produced ; but that they are 
produced, and that, too, in many cases, without 
deception, cannot be successfully questioned. 

Among these facts may be mentioned the fol- 
lowing : 

Tables have been raised from the floor, and 
carried into different parts of a room without 
visible human aid, while herculean efforts were 
being made to arrest them. President Mahan 
mentions several well-attested cases of tables 
moved in every possible direction, and with great 



22 SPIRITUALISM. 

force ; of a table seen to rise from the floor, and 
to float in the atmosphere for several seconds ; 
of a table, on which was seated a Mr. Wells, 
rocking to and fro with great violence, and at 
length poising itself on two legs, and remaining 
in that position for some thirty seconds, with no 
other person in contact with it. (Modem Mys- 
teries Explained, etc., pp. 112, 113.) 

Chairs and other articles of furniture have 
been seen to deliberately move about a house, 
unimpelled by visible human agency, and in 
many instances have been known to be broken 
into fragments. 

Piano-fortes have discoursed the sweetest mu- 
sic, with their key-boards pressed closely to the 
wall, and no human hand upon the keys. I 
have received such statements from the lips of 
credible witnesses, persons who at present have 
no connection with Spiritualism. 

Guitars have repeatedly discoursed music 
quite as sweet, while moving around a room 
without human aid. In Auburn, N. T., in the 
presence of many witnesses, a guitar is said to 



SPIRITUALISM. 23 

have been " taken from the hands of those who 
held it and put in tune^ and to have commenced 
playing while it passed around the room above 
their heads." — History of Mysterious JVoises^ 
p. 72. 

"A very intelligent Christian lady," says 
President Mahan, "an utter disbeliever in 
Spiritualism, told us, that in her presence a 
guitar was once placed in the middle of the 
room; that when no one was within several 
feet of it, musical sounds proceeded from it," 
etc. — Modern Mysteries ^ etc., p. 117. 

House-hells have been lifted from their places 
and rung over the heads of numerous spectators. 
This is quite common. Judge Edmonds speaks 
of such matters frequently. On one occasion he 
says, " The bell was taken out of M.'s hand and 
rung, and then put back again. This occurred 
several times in the course of the evening." 
A.gain, he says, " The bell was rung over 
our heads," etc. — Spiritualism^ vol. i, pp. 22, 
23, 26. 

Articles of clothing have been snatched from 



24 SPIRITUALISM. 

the persons of many by an unseen hand, and in 
the presence of many witnesses. 

The author last mentioned speaks of a shawl 
being "snatched from a lady's shoulders, and 
thrown on the floor." — P. 24. 

Many similar cases might be named. 

Some have been nearly thrown upon the 
floor, and others haye been arrested and firmly 
held by an invisible agent. Says Judge Ed- 
monds, " Some were pulled down upon the sofa ; 
one was pulled nearly on to the floor ; one had 
her feet shoved from under her, so that she 
nearly fell." " One of the party was forcibly 
torn by an invisible power from my grasp, in 
spite alike of his strength and mine." " I felt 
on one of my arms what seemed to be the grip 
of an iron hand. I felt distinctly the thumb 
and flngers, the palm of the hand, and the ball 
of the thumb ; and it held me fast by a power 
which I struggled to escape from in vain. No 
earthly hand could thus have held me, for I was 
as powerless in that grip as a fly would be in 
the grasp of my hand. And it continued with 



SPIRITUALISM. 25 

me until I had tried every means I could devise 
to get rid of it ; and not until I thoroughly felt 
how powerless I was, did it leave me." — Spiritr 
ualism^ vol. i, pp. 24, 26, 27. 

Responses hy rapping cmd writing have been 
received to mental questions, tnown only to 
the inquirer. Facts unknown to the parties 
at the time, and many facts regarded false at 
the time, have subsequently proved to be as 
stated by the medium. 

Dr. Hare states that he sent a message by 
a spirit, from Ca^e May to Philadelphia, with 
regard to bank business of which he was un- 
certain. The spirit communicated with Mrs. 
Gourlay, of Philadelphia, through whose hus- 
band the proper inquiries were made at the 
bank, and the answer returned to Dr. Hare, 
by the same spirit, all in two hours and a 
half. Such facts are quite numerous. 

The facsimile of a handwriting the medium 
had never seen has been produced; while 
paper has been written upon with pen and 
inkj when it is known that no human being 



26 SPIRITUALISM. 

was in the room at the time; neither was 
there pen nor ink present. Not only do we 
find many such statements in the productions 
of spiritualists, but we have received them 
from the lips of those who, having formerly been 
connected with spiritualism, had abandoned it. 

Mediums have pronounced such discourses, 
as it is known they never did nor could pro- 
nounce in a normal state. 

Persons are said to have been restored to 
health by prescriptions purporting to come from 
the spirits of departed physicians. 

These are a few of the facts of Spiritualism. 
The list might be greatly extended, including 
many more marvelous than we have men- 
tioned. 

Spiritualism claims to he a religious system. 
It has its altars, its priests, its Church services, 
and revelations. It goes farther, and lays claim 
to being a New Dispensation. 

Judge Edmonds says : " As under the Mo- 
saic Dispensation mankind were taught the 
existence of God, rather than the thousand 



SPIRITUALISM. 27 

gods with mortal attributes then worshiped; 
and under the Christian dispensation they were 
taught the immortality of the soul and its exist- 
ence forever ; so now, under this new dispensa- 
tion it is being revealed to them, for the first 
time, what that state of existence is, and how, 
in this life, they may well and wisely prepare 
to enter upon " it. — Yol. i, p. 65. 

He further says : " As came the dispensa- 
tion through Christ, so came this, in a state 
of almost universal peace, " etc. — P. 66. 

Dr. Hare shouts over it : " Praise be to God 
that he has sent us a new way of religious 
light." — Spiritualism^ etc., p. 208. 

To the " New Testament, as Corrected by 
the Spirits," a new book is added, entitled, 
" Ifew Dispensation^'^ which begins thus : 

"I, Jesus, appeared in spirit in 1861, and 
do say and declare unto the world that the 
new era or dispensation has commenced, 
called the coming of Christ. It commenced 
about the year 1847, and as represented and 
spoken of by the prophet Daniel and others, 



28 SPIRITUALISM. 

by my coming as a clond in the heavens, with 
tens of thousands of angels, to overshadow the 
earth with my glory." 

" We are called to witness," says the Ban- 
ner of Light, " the beginning of a New Era 
in the history of Man." 

" I expected of it (Spiritualism) as I would 
of the advent of a Jesus Christ." — Banner of 
Lights January 18, 1862. 

Speaking of peifection^ a spirit says :. " But 
the new dispensation gives a new definition 
to all things, and therefore to perfection." — 
Banner of Lights March 8, 1862. 

It denies the divine authority of the Bible, 
claiming superiority for its own revelations. 

It denies the divinity of Christ, regarding 
him as a medium only, still progressing in 
the spheres. 

It denies the atonement, claiming that man 
only needs development. 

It has no redemption through Christ, no 
salvation by faith, no gracious regeneration by 
the Spirit. 



SPIRITUALISM. 29 

It lias no resurrection from the dead, no 
3ternal judgment. 

With Spiritualism, the God of the Bible 
was a ferocious spirit, more nearly representing 
our ideas of a devil than a God. 

It claims that all human actions are in 
such a sense the result of necessity, as that 
no man could have acted differently from what 
he has done. 

It claims that sin is an impossibility, and 
that vice is virtue under another name. 

It is claimed that hell is the ante-chamber 
to heaven, and all must pass through hell to 
reach heaven. Such, in brief, are some of the 
facts and teachings of Spiritualism. 

We shall have occasion to speak in an- 
other place of the character and fruits of this 
system, when its theology and morals will be 
more fully considered. 

We are now prepared to show that this 
strange system, instead of being a New Dis- 
pensation^ as claimed by its chief supporters, 
is older than Christianity, and has had its 



30 SPIRITUALISM. 

periodical developments in the past, and has 
been always found fighting against God, and 
Jesus Christ whom he has sent. To this 
examination we call special attention in the 
following pages. 



SPIBITUALISM. 51 



CHAPTEE II. 

ANCIEKT SORCERY. 

It will be admitted that the distingnisliing 
characteristic of modern Spiritualism is its 
professed intercourse with the spirits of the 
dead. Indeed, its advocates claim that in the 
process of human development this intercourse 
with the spirit-world is an advance on any- 
former dispensation. But so far from Spiritual- 
ism being a new dispensation, we are prepared 
to show that the Greeks and Romans, before 
the establishment of Christianity, could boast 
of intercourse with the spirit-world, through 
their oracles, equal to anything yet seen in 
modern Spiritualism. 

The terms employed to describe this com- 
merce are, necromancy^ sorcery^ witchcraft^ 
magic^ enchantment^ divination^ familiar 
spirits^ etc. 



32 SPTEITUALISM. 

A definition of these terms will tlirow some 
light upon this subject. 

1. '' Necromancy ^'^ says Dr. Stackhonse, "is 
the art of raising np the dead in order to pry 
into future events, or to be informed of the fate 
of the living." Calmet says "it consisted in 
raising up the ghosts of individuals deceased." 
Buck says it is " the art of revealing future 
events by conversing with the dead." 

" Necromancers^'^ says Campbell, " are those 
who consult the dead." Dr. Lowth says they 
"are those who consult with evil spirits." 
Brown says they " were those who pretended 
to raise and consult with such persons as were 
dead." Dr. Jahn says, " necromancers pre- 
tended that they were able by their incanta- 
tions to summon back departed spirits from 
their abodes. They uttered the communica- 
tions which they pretended to receive from 
the dead." 

If Stackhouse, and Calmet, and Buck, and 
Campbell, and Lowth, and Brown, and Jahn, 
have correctly defined necromancy, what is it 



SPIRITUALISM. 33 

but modern Spiritualism? or, what is modern 
Spiritualism but ancient necromancy? 

2. " SorcererSy^^ says Gesenius, " are those 
who profess to call up the dead." " Sorcery," 
says Dr. Webster, is "the power of command- 
ing evil spirits." 

3. " Magic,^^ says Calmet, is " the invocation 
of the devil." Dr. Webster says it "is the 
science of producing wonderful effects by the 
aid of superhuman beings, or of departed 
spirits." 

4. " Witchcraft comprehends," says Brown, 
" all kinds of influence produced by collusion 
with Satan." Burkett says it is a "devilish 
art." Dr. Webster says, " it is intercourse 
with the dead." 

5. " Enchantment^^^ says Dr. Webster, " is 
the art of producing certain wonderful effects 
by the invocation or aid of demons, or the 
agency of certain supposed spirits." "' An 
enchanter is one who has spirits or demons 
at his command ; one who practices enchant- 
ment, or pretends to perform surprising things 

3 



84: SPIEITUALISM. 

by the agency of demons." Brown says they 
are such as "pretended to work things won- 
derful by superhuman influence." 

6. "■Divination,^' says Dr. Stackhouse, "is 
being in league and covenant with the devil, 
and doing many astonishing things by his 
help." " To divine, ordinarily signifies," says 
Brown, "to find out and foretell secret or 
future things by some sinful and diabolical 
means." " A diviner," says Dr. Webster, " is 
one who pretends to predict events, or to 
reveal occult things, by the aid of superior 
beings, or of supernatural means." 

Y. Familiar sj>irit, or the word familiar 
applied to spirit, says Mr. Barnes, is the word 
the Hebrews "used particularly to denote one 
who was supposed to have power to call up 
tlie dead, to learn of them respecting future 
events." Isa. viii, 19. Brown says, ''familiar 
spirits are such devils as converse with wiz- 
ards, and the like." Dr. Webster says, "a 
familiar spirit is a demon, or evH spirit, 
supposed to attend at a call." 



SPIKITUALISM. 35 

Mr. Benson says, " the spirits of dead men 
were supposed to speak in ttie images or 
idols worshiped by the heathen." 

Mr. Barnes says : " Among heathen nations, 
nothing was more common than for persons to 
profess to have intercourse with spirits, and to 
be under the influence of their inspiration." 

" It was the opinion of many," says Dr. 
Lardner, "that evil angels and spirits were 
allowed to visit the region of our air and 
this earth, and to inflict diseases and other 
calamities upon men." 

It is very clear that the ancient sorcerers, 
necromancers, enchanters, etc., professed to do 
all that modern spiritualists profess to do. 
They profess to perform their wonders by the 
aid of superhuman or spiritual beings. They 
claimed that the spirits which aided them were 
the spirits of their demigods, heroes, and de- 
parted friends. "We shall see, in the course of 
this examinatioUj that their claim is as well 
founded as that of spiritualists. 

Identical in character with the necromancerB, 



36 SPIEITUALISM. 

sorcerers, etc., mentioned in the Scriptures, were 
the priests of the oracles of Greece and Eome. 

These oracles were the pagan deities who 
gave, or were supposed to give, answers to 
inquiries made respecting affairs of importance, 
usually respecting future events, and the suc- 
cess of important enterprises. They were quite 
numerous. 

The oracle of Trophonius was held in high 
repute. The mediums, when in the trance 
state, had revealed to them, it is said, much 
of futurity. Some are said to have been see- 
ing mediums, and could describe by sight ; 
while others were hearing mediums, and de- 
scribed what they heard. They became stupe- 
fied, and out of their senses. They were then 
placed in the chair of the goddess of memory, 
and by her aid were enabled to relate what 
they had seen and heard. These efforts, it is 
said, produced great physical prostration. 

The oracle of Claros was remarkable for its 
poetical genius. It could, among other remark- 
able things, deliver answers in verse upon 



SPIRITUALISM. 37 

what persons had in their thoughts, though 
often very ignorant, and knowing nothing of 
composing in rhyme. This oracle is said to 
have foretold the sudden death of Germanicus, 
the accomplished Eoman general. 

Passing over a large number of inferior 
oracles, we come to consider the most famous 
one of all antiquity, the oracle of Apollo at 
Delphos, worshiped under the name of Pythian ; 
so called from the serpent Python, or from the 
Greek word puthesthai^ which signifies to in- 
qidre^ because the peoj)le came there to consult 
him. From thence the Delphic priestess was 
called Pythia, and the games were celebrated 
and known as the Pythian games. 

Diodorus says that there was a cavity upon 
Parnassus from which exhalations arose pro- 
ducing wonderful efiects. On approaching it 
the brain became intoxicated, and even beasts 
were seriously affected by it. A shepherd ap- 
proaching it was seized with violent agitations 
of body, and pronounced words which he did 
not understand, but words said to have foretold 



38 SPIRITUALISM. 

futurity. The influence was regarded as some- 
thing divine, and a priestess — a woman of 
course — was appointed to receive and transmit 
the divine communications. These priestesses 
were nothing more or less than trance-mediums, 
with which Spiritualism abounds. They multi- 
plied with great rapidity, and the people flocked 
from all quarters to inquire of them, either by 
word of mouth or in writing, with regard to the 
secret things of the present and future. 

Under the influence of the miraculous vapor, 
" the hair of the priestess," says EoUin, " stood 
upright upon her head ; her look grew wild and 
furious ; she foamed at the mouth, while a sud- 
den and violent trembling seized her whole body, 
with all the symptoms of distraction and frenzy." 

Yirgil, referring to the same thing, says, 

''The virgin cries, The god I behold the god I 
And straight her visage and her color change ; 
Her hair disheveled, and her heaving breast 
And laboring heart are swollen with sacred rage ; 
Larger she seems ; her voice, no mortal sound, 
As the inspiring god, near and more near, 
Seizes her soul." 



SPIEITUALISM. ^ 89 

Virgil says again, 

"She fetched up souls out of their tomb.'* 

And again, 

" She raiseth souls out of their graves." 

This description by Virgil of the priestess of 
Apollo so accurately portrays the spiritualistic 
mediums of the present day that comment is 
unnecessary. 

We have said there were poetical mediums, 
who delivered the communications of the oracles 
in verse. 

These verses are said to have been very bad, 
at least in many instances; so much so that 
many were much surprised that Apollo, who 
presided in the choir of the Muses, by whom 
these verses were supposed to have been in- 
spired, should have been so bad a rhymer. But 
Plutarch defends Apollo, and claims that he did 
not compose the verses of the medium, but sim- 
ply inflamed her imagination, and kindled in 
her soul that living light which unvailed all of 
futurity to her. The substance of the communi- 



40 « SPIRITUALISM. 

cations was inspired, while the manner of ex- 
pressing it was left to the genius and natural 
talent of the medium. He says, 

" The first inspiration alone comes from him, 
(Apollo,) which is, however, adapted to the na- 
ture of every prophetess. Therefore, voice and 
sound, expression and meter, do not belong to 
Apollo, but to the woman ; he only inspires her 
with the images and conceptions, and inflames 
her soul so that it can see the future." — History 
of Magic^ vol. i, p. 416. 

It is very remarkable that spiritualists employ 
Plutarch's reasoning to meet the objections urged 
against the genuineness of many modern com- 
munications purporting to come from persons 
remarkable for their good sense while in the body. 

Take the following samples of poetic genius, 
communicated, professedly, by Washington and 
Franklin. The first is "Washington, drawing 
his own portrait in verse. (Love and Wisdom, 
from the Spirit World.) 

" When the likeness of this portrait you see, 
Remember that it is to represent the likeness of me; 



SPIRITUALISM. 41 

But the spirit in its brightness you cannot see, 
Eor that is far above the likeness of thee." 

Here follows some lines composed by the 
great mind of Franklin, after some seventy 
years' residence in his " angels' home :" 

" The likeness of this portrait is to represent 
The likeness of man when he dwelt here below ; 
But the likeness of the spirit you would like to know, 
As this would be no more than I would like to show ; 
But the mind is not prepared the likeness for to see 
Of the spirit in his angel's home as bright as we." 

If Apollo's mediums succeeded in grinding 
out meaner poetry iSian this, they needed a 
Plutarch to defend them. 

Judge Edmonds offers the same explanation 
for modern mediums that Plutarch does for the 
ancient. He says, " The visions which I have 
are impressed on my mind as vividly and dis- 
tinctly as any material object can be; yet in 
giving them to others, I must rely upon and use 
my own powers of observation, my own memory, 
my own command of language. At other times 
the thought is given me sentence by sentence, 
and I know not what idea or sentence is to fol- 



42 SPIRITUALISM. 

low ; but the language used is my own, and is 
selected by myself from my own memory's store- 
house. At other times the whole current of 
thought or process of reasoning is given me in 
advance, and I choose for myself the language 
and the illustrations used to convey it, and some- 
times the order of giving it. But in all these 
modes there is more or less of myself in them, 
more or less of my individuality underlying it all." 
" I have noticed the same thing in the doctor." 
(G. T. Dexter.) '' The main idea might be 
transmitted correctly enough, but it would be 
liable to various shadings, from the different 
capacity of the messengers to comprehend it, 
and from the variety of their power of lan- 
guage to utter iV'^— Spiritualism, vol, ii, pp. ' 
39, 40, 43. 

How perfectly does Judge Edmond's defense 
of the mediums of modern Spiritualism agree 
with Plutarch's defense of the oracles of 
Greece. 

There were many who questioned the ability 
of the oracles to foretell future events, or ac- 



SPIRITUALISM. 43 

curately describe what was transpiring at a dis- 
tance. To detect wliat they regarded as im- 
position, resort was had to stratagem ; and " it 
must be confessed/' says Eollin, "that some- 
times the answer of the oracles was clear and 
circumstantial." 

The wealthy Croesus, King of Lydia, sent 
his embassador and demanded of the oracle 
to inform him what he was doing at a given 
time. The oracle of Delphos replied that he 
was causing a tortoise and a lamb to be dress- 
ed in a vessel of brass, which was really so. 

The Emperor Trajan made a like demand 
of the oracle at Heliopolis, by sending a sealed 
letter, to which he demanded an answer. The 
oracle replied by sending to the emperor a 
bit of blank paper nicely folded and sealed. 
Trajan was amazed to find the answer in 
perfect harmony with the letter sent, which 
contained nothing but blank paper. 

" It was customary," says RoUin, " to con- 
sult the oracles by sealed letters, which were 
laid upon the altar of the god unopened." 



44 SPIRITUALISM. 

It was claimed that demons moved the 
fluids, both of the interior and exterior senses, 
and thus presented to the organs certain forms, 
just as they would outwardly meet us, not 
only in sleep, but when awake. " Thus de- 
mons do really affect us," they say, " and com- 
municate knowledge." — Spiritualism Tested. 

Jamblicus, a Platonic philosopher and dis- 
ciple of Porphyry, in the third century, wrote 
a treatise on the subject of spiritual mysteries 
among the Egyptians, Chaldeans, and Assyri- 
ans, in which he gives a brief description of 
a spiritualistic medium of these times, which 
will be recognized as a correct representation 
of a modern medium : 

"Some are agitated throughout the whole 
body ; others, in some of their members ; others, 
again, are entirely quiet. Sometimes there 
are pleasing harmonies, dances, and according- 
voices, and sometimes the reverse. Again, the 
body either appears taller, or larger, or is 
borne aloft through the air, or is affected by 
the opposite of these." 



SPIRITUALISM. 45 

Again, "Inspiration is the work neither of 
sonl nor body, nor of their entire compound. 
The true cause is no other than illnmination 
emanating from the very gods themselves, and 
spirits coming forth from them, and an obses- 
sion by which they hold us fully and abso- 
lutely, absorbing all our faculties even, and 
exterminating all human motions and opera- 
tions, even to consciousness itself; bringing 
discourses which they who utter them do not 
understand, but pronounce with furious lip, so 
that our whole being becomes secondary, and 
subservient to the sole power of the occupy- 
ing god." — -Beecher^ pp. 38, 39. 

The Sibylline oracles^ or verses^ are of the 
same character. 

The ancients represent the Sibyl as a woman 
endowed with a prophetic spirit, and roving 
from country to country, vending her pre- 
dictions, which were nothing more than the 
productions of writing mediums. They were 
somewhat numerous in various parts of Greece 
and other places. Their predictions were 



46 SPIRITUALISM. 

usually delivered in verse, and contained, it is 
said, acconnts of heaven, hell, and the condi 
tion of the dead. They were highly esteemed. 
The Sibyl of Cnmo wrote her predictions 
on the leaves of a tree. They were sold to 
the king of the Romans, who caused them to 
be carefully laid up in an urn, or stone pot, 
in the capital, and officers placed over them. 
In this manner superhuman knowledge is said 
to have been sought among the Romans. 

Speaking of these mediums, the historian 
Du Pin says, "They were transported with 
enthusiasm and extravagant fury, caused by 
the possession of demons." Inspiration was 
claimed for them ; but he remarks, " we need 
only read the description that is made of all 
the ancient oracles. It was so evident among 
the heathen that they were possessed, that they 
applied the word to them which signified, " to 
play the madman." 

" Now this fury that deprived them of their 
senses cannot be esteemed as an inspiration 
of the Holy Ghost, but as an efiect of theit 



SPIRITUALISM. 47 

being possessed with demons." — Ecoles, Hist^ 
p. 18. 

Justin Martyr says, "The Sibyl was born 
at Babylon, and came thence to Cumo, where 
she revealed future things. She speaks great 
and wonderful things, knowing not herself 
what she says. When she begins to lose the 
inspiring spirit, she loses at the same time 
the memory of all that she has foretold." 

Healing Mediums were very numerous, and 
are said to have performed wonders in that line. 

Under the reign of Claudius, the temple of 
JEsculapius, son of the famous Apollo, and 
god of the healing art, was so celebrated on 
account of the cures there performed, that it 
became a place of general resort for the sick. 
Masters sent their slaves thither to be healed ; 
and by a decree of the emperor, all so healed 
became free. 

In Nero's time these consultations in the 
temple were very common. Pliny gives some 
of the curative means recommended. 

A temple was erected by Junius Bubulcus 



48 SPIRITUALISM. 

to Hygeia, daughter of ^sculapius, and god- 
dess of healtli. (History of Magic, vol. i, p. 
435.) Marvelous were tlie cures she is said 
to have wrought. From this originated the 
term Hygiene : meaning, " That department 
.of medicine which treats of the preservation 
of health." — Wehster. 

" The stoic hints that wonders of healing, and 
strange powers of reading and writing, accom- 
panied the influence." — S^piritualism Tested^ 
p. 86. 

"Its relation to medicine," says President 
Samson, " gave it its first grasp on hmnan life." 

" Circles " were as common then as they are 
now. 

In speaking of mercenary soothsaying, Cicero 
says, "I have no confidence in fortune-tellers, 
mercenary soothsayers, nor circlesP It is very 
remarkable that the word here rendered " cir- 
cle " [psychomantium] means precisely what is 
meant by a modern spiritualistic circle — "a 
place where one inquires anything of the spirits 
of the dead." For what pm^ose are spiritual 



SPIRITUALISM. 49 

circles established, but to inquire of the spirits 
of the dead?" 

In speaking of real soothsaying, Cicero 
Bays : 

" They believe that in the spirit of man dwells 
an oracle, by which the future may be perceived, 
either when the soul is excited by divine inspi- 
ration^ or when through sleep the soul expands 
herself unfettered." — History of Magic ^ p. 137. 

The Trojan ^neas goes in confident devo- 
sion to the cave of the Cumean sybil, where 
spirits communicate with mortals. The siby] 
displays wonderful knowledge of his family. 
Through this medium he receives communica- 
tions from the shade or spirit of his father An- 
chises. These communications are said to have 
been received by the sibyl when in sleeping 
vision or magnetic trance ; for ^^ from the ivory 
gate of sleep Anchises at last releases them." 

Of the various methods by which knowledge^ 
of spiritual things was gained, Pliny mentions 
" conversation with disembodied spirits and in- 
ferior deities." He speaks of Apion, who de- 

4 



50 SPIKITUALISM. 

clared that he himself had called up departed 
spirits, in order to inquire of Homer of what 
country and what ancestors he was born ; while, 
nevertheless, he did not dare to publish what he 
had replied. (Spiritualism Tested, p. 81.) 

Achilles is said to have been first thoroughly 
convinced of the reality of the future life and 
the spirit-world when the shade of Patroclus, 
his slaughtered friend, appeared to him. He 
felt the hand and saw the glistening eye of the 
goddess Minerva checking him. (Spiritualism 
Tested, p. 90.) 

Let no one imagine that we are writing of 
the faith and practice of modern Spiritualism 
from the facts witnessed around us daily ; we 
are describing scenes which were witnessed two 
thousand years ago. But who does not see in 
this description of ancient sorcery a full-length 
portrait of modern Spiritualism ? What is the 
boast of modern Spiritualism over the sorcery 
and magic of the ancients ? Does Spiritualism 
lay as its foundation stone intercourse with the 
spirit-world? 



SPIRITUALISM. 51 

The " Banner of Light " for Dec. 28, I86I5 
Bays, "The basic fact of Spiritualism is the 
belief that certain phenomena, occurring in a 
way that renders them impossible to be the re- 
sult of human action, are produced by an intel- 
ligent though invisible agency. That the intel- 
ligence communicated is identical with certain 
deceased persons ; hence, that the agency is hu- 
man, spiritual, and actually proceeds from the 
disembodied souls of mortals." 

But is not this the " basic fact " of ancient 
necromancy ? The whole system was built upon 
this "fact;" hence Spiritualism, in its "basic 
fact," is but a reproduction of the old magic. 
This is progress with a vengeance ! This is your 
boasted new light ! Does Spiritualism claim to 
foretell what is yet to be ? A prophetic spirit 
is their boast. But does not this also find its 
counterpart in ancient sorcery ? They have re- 
corded as many wonders in this regard as Spirit- 
ualism can boast of. 

Does Spiritualism boast of a multiplicity of 
mediums — speaking, writing, seeing, healing, 



52 SPIRITUALISM. 

and developing? Ancient sorcery could boast 
of as great a variety. They had their oracle at 
Delphos, whose prince was Beelzebub; their 
vessels of fury, whose prince was Belial ; their 
revenging devils, whose prince was Asmodeus ; 
their cozens^ who belonged to magicians and 
witches, whose prince was Satan ; their aerial 
demons, who caused plagues, thunder, and fire, 
whose prince was Merison ; their captain of the 
furies, causing wars, tumults, and uproars, whose 
prince was Abaddon; their calumniating de- 
mons, driving men into despair, whose prince 
was Daiabolas ; their several kinds of tempting 
demons, whose prince was Mammon. Thej^ 
could speak, and write, and heal the sick, and 
see the future, as much to the satisfaction of the 
people then living as Spiritualists do in these 
days. The old magic has simply arisen from 
the dead, and therefore mighty works do show 
forth themselves in it. They had their circles, 
their lectures, and their physical manifestations 
then, as these have them now. Spiritualism has 
Bunply left the light of Christianity and the Book 



SPIRITUALISM. 63 

of God's counsels, and gone "back two or three 
thousand years into pagan darkness; proving 
that word true, " If our light become darkness, 
how great is that darkness." 

Men who wish to advance backward into Pa- 
ganism can do so by embracing modern Spirit- 
ualism. 



54 SPIRITUALISM, 



CHAPTEE III. 

ISTEW TESTAMEISTT DEMON"OLOG-Y. 

The subject of New Testament Denwnology 
has long been a fruitful topic of discusrion, pro- 
ducing no little confusion in the oommon mind. 
We shall enter into this discussion just far 
enough to present the subject in a clear light, 
and present such facts as shall go to identify it 
with the Spiritualism of these times. 

There are four words employed in the New 
Testament, rendered in our English version 
Satan and devil. "We call the reader's attention 
to the import of these words, in order to a proper 
understanding of the subject. 

1. Didbolos, This word signifies, according 
to Robinson, ^^traducer, accuser, slanderer, 
devil." It occurs thirty-eight times in the New 
Testament, and in every case save four is ber 
yond all doubt applied to the prince of fallen 



SPIBITUALISM. 55 

angels. The exceptions are Jolin vi, TO, where 
Judas is called a devil; 1 Tim. iii, 11, where the 
word is rendered slanderers / 2 Tim. iii, 3, and 
Titus ii, 3, where it is rendered false acGusers. 

" But nothing is easier," says Campbell, "than 
to distinguish this application from the more 
frequent application to the arch-apostate. One 
mark of distinction is that, in this last use of the 
term, it is never found in the plural. When 
the plural is used, the context always shows that 
it is human beings, and not fallen angels, that 
are spoken of." "Another criterion, whereby 
the application of this word to the prince of 
darkness may be discovered, is its being attended 
with the article." — Dissertation YI, vol. i, p. 241. 

As examples of the use of JDidbolos^ we men 
tion the following : 

" Then was Jesus led up of the Spirit into the 
wilderness to be tempted of the devil." Matt, 
iv, 1. "The enemy that sowed them is the 
devil." Matt, xiii, 39. "Depart from me,, ye 
cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the 
devil and Ms angels." Matt, xxv, 41. " Kesist 



56 SPIRITUALISM. 

tlie devil and he will flee from you." James 
i V, 7. " He that committeth sin is of the devil." 
1 John iii, 8. 

Let it be remembered that Diaholos is never 
applied to those IsTew Testament demons cast 
out by Christ and the apostles. Another term 
is used, as we shall see, when they are spoken of. 

2. Satanas, or Satan. This is a Hebrew word, 
introduced into New Testament Greek com- 
positions. In Hebrew, according to Gesenius, 
it means, "an adversary, an enemy, Satan;" 
and according to Eobinson, it is the Hebrew 
proper name for the devil. It never occurs in 
the plural. Though we frequently read of devils, 
we never read of Satans, from which we infer 
that it denotes the chief of evil spirits or devils. 
It is used about thirty times in the New Testa- 
ment. As examples of its use, take the follow- 
ing: 

" Satan cometh and taketh away the word 
that was sown in their hearts." Mark iv, 15. 

"I beheld Satan as lightning fall from 
hp^Y^n." I^uke X, 18, 



SPIBITUALISM. 57 

" And after the sop, Satan entered into him," 
John xiii, 27 

" Why hath Satan filled thine heart to lie to 
the Holy Ghost." Acts v, 3. 

"And the God of peace shall bruise Satan 
under your feet shortly." Rom. xvi, 20. 

" Satan himself is transformed into an angel 
of light." 2 Cor. xi, 14. 

" And he laid hold on the dragon, that old 
serpent, which is the devil and Satan." Eey. 
XX, 2. 

These are sufficient to show the use made of 
this term by the inspired writers. It will bo 
seen that this, too, is not the word employed by 
them when speaking of the spirits or devils cast 
out by Christ and the apostles. 

3. Daimon. According to Robinson, this 
word, in its New Testament meaning, signifies 
" a demon, an evil spirit, devil." It occurs only 
five times in the New Testament ; once in each 
of the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke, 
and twice in the Apocalypse. In the three Gos- 
pels it refers to the same possession — the man in 



68 SPIRITUALISM. 

the country of the Gadarenes, who haunted the 
sepulchers. It occurs also in Key. xvi, 14 : " For 
they are the spirits of devils." Rev. xviii, 2, 
Babylon " is become the habitation of devils." 

4. Daimonion. This word is derived from 
the one last mentioned, and has the same mean- 
ing. In fact they are used interchangeably in 
the ISTew Testament. 

When a devil or devils are said to have been 
cast out by Christ, these [daimon and daimo- 
nion] are the terms employed to denote the being 
who was cast out. They are called demons, or 
devils, according to our translation. This word 
occurs about sixty times in the New Testament, 
and is not once confounded with diabolos^ which 
occurs thirty-eight times, showing that the 
beings denoted by these two terms are not the 
same. " But what sets the difference of signifi- 
cation in the clearest light," says Campbell, "is 
that, though both words, didbolos and daimo- 
nion^ occur often in the Septuagint, they are in- 
variably used for translating different Hebrew 
words, Didbolos is always in Hebrew either 



SPIRITUALISM. 59 

tsar^ enemy, or Satan^ adversary ; words never 
translated daimonion. This latter word, on the 
contrary, is made to express some Hebrew term 
signifying idol, pagan deity, apparition, or what 
some render satyr." 

There is but one passage in the New Testa- 
ment in which this word is not rendered devil. 
The exception is Acts xvii, 18, "He seemeth to 
be a setter forth of strange gods." Here the 
term is rendered gods^ and is so used in harmony 
with the faith of the heathen Greeks, who re- 
garded the demon as a deity, a god, good or 
bad. 

As examples of the New Testament use of 
daimonion, we submit the following : 

" And he healed many that were sick of divers 
diseases, and cast out many devils ; and suifered 
not the devils to speak, because they knew him." 
Mark i, 34. 

" But the Pharisees said. He casteth out devils 
through the prince of the devils." Matt, ix, 34. 

" And devils also came out of many." Luke 
iv, 41. 



60 SPIRITUALISM. 

" Can a devil open the eyes of the blind ?" 
John x, 20. 

" The devils also believe and tremble." John 
ii, 19. 

Every one must see at a glance that daimo- 
nion does not apply to the prince of devils, or 
Satan proper, bnt to an inferior or subordinate 
class of devils. 

It has been claimed that these demons were 
not spiritual beings; but that in some texts 
nothing more is meant than a personified prin- 
ciple of evil ; in others, the evil propensity in 
human nature ; in others, personal enemies ; in 
others, diseases, such as madness, or violent in- 
sanity. There seems to be no uniform method 
of scriptural interpretation among those who 
deny the existence of devils. But it requires 
more faith than we are in possession of to be- 
lieve that the inspired writers could have used 
language so vaguely. It must be admitted that 
if the existence of demons is denied, no common 
sense explanation can be given of demoniac pos- 
sessions ; and no one can successfully vindicate 



SPIRITUALISM. 61 

the writers of the New Testament against the 
charge of being either ignorant of their subject, 
or of lacking a kaowledge of the proper terms 
to set it forth. 

""When I find mention made of the num- 
ber of demons in particular possessions, their 
actions expressly distinguished from those of 
the man possessed; conversations held by the 
former about the disposal of them after their 
expulsion, and accounts given how they were 
actually disposed of; when I find desires and 
passions ascribed peculiarly to them, and simil- 
itudes taken from the conduct which they 
usually observe, it is impossible for me to 
deny their existence, without admitting that 
the sacred historians were either deceived 
themselves in regard to them, or intended to 
deceive their readers." — Campbell^ vol. i, p. 252. 

If you call these demons a personified prin- 
ciple of evil, you encounter the facts of a 
legion of these evil principles entering into 
one man, and that theae personified principles 
of evil were transferred from men to hogs; 



62 SPIEITUALISM. 

proying, as Dr. Lee very justly remarks, that 
"hogs for once actually possessed human de- 
pravity." 

If you call them diseases, which most per- 
sons who deny real possessions are inclined to 
do, you encounter the difficulty that when 
these diseases are about to be cast out, they 
express an earnest desire not to be sent out of 
the country, preferring to go into the swine, 
which request is granted. That must have 
been a complicated disease of which a legion 
are cast out of one man, and seven go out of 
one woman. 

If you say that by devils is meant insanity, 
you vrill encounter the difficulty of a legion 
of insanities entering into one man, and then 
transferred from the man to swine, at their 
own request. 

The 'New Testament writers clearly distin- 
guish between diseases of all kinds, and devils, 
or, as they are sometimes termed, " unclean 
spirits." Two texts must suffice. 

Matt, iv, xxix, "And they brought unto 



SPIEITUALISM. 63 

him all sick people that were taken with 
divers diseases and torments, and those which 
were possessed with devils, and those which 
were lunatic, and those that had the palsy, 
and he healed them." From this scripture 
we learn that being possessed of devils was 
not being sick with divers diseases and tor- 
ments, nor was it being a lunatic, a mad- 
man, What could it have been to answer 
the description of the writer ? 

Mark i, xxxiv, " And he healed many that 
were sick of divers diseases, and cast out 
many devils ; and suffered not the devils to 
speak, because they knew him." 

The additional facts in this case are the 
knowledge displayed by the demons, and the 
disposition which they manifested to speak. 
They knew Jesus, and on that account he 
suffered them not to speak. If these posses- 
sions were diseases, then diseases have intel- 
ligence, volition, and the power of speech. 

All this was done in the presence of a 
people who firmly believed in the reality of 



64 ^ spikitualis;m:. 

demoniacal possessions. N'ow, if Christ did 
not cast ont real devils, he deceived the 
people by practicing a solemn farce before 
them. 

" An appeal may be made/' says Rev. 
L. Lee, " to common sense, that the in- 
sanity, if there be any insanity in the case, 
must be with the writer, he who gave such 
an account of the cnre of an insane per- 
son, or with the reader, who understands the 
history of the case to be an account of the 
cure of an insane man." — Theology, p. 236. 

Take the account given of the damsel 
possessed of a spirit of divination, who troub- 
led Paul and his companions at Philippi; 
also, the account given of the sons of Sceva 
attempting to cast out a demon, after the 
manner of Paul's casting them out at Ephe- 
sus. That was a strange disease which ex- 
claimed, " Jesus I know, and Paul I know, 
but who are ye ? " 

But it may be asked, "Where is the evi- 
dence that these possessions were the same 



SPIRITUALISM. 65 

as the sorcery of the Greeks, Romans, etc. ? 
In order to answer this inquiry, let us 
inquire into the belief of the Jews on the 
subject, and the treatment of that belief by 
Christ and the Apostles. 

Dr. Kitto says, ^^It was the general belief 
of the Jewish nation, except the Sadducees, 
and of most other nations, that the spirits of 
dead men," especially the wicked, were per- 
mitted to enter the bodies of men. 

Josephus, who may be regarded as a safe 
expositor of Jewish opinion on this subject, 
says, " Demons are the spirits of wicked men, 
who enter into living men, and destroy them, 
unless they are so happy as to meet with 
speedy relief." 

Drs. Lardner and Jahn, though disposed to 
question the real existence of demons, admit 
that the Jews believed this dogma. 

Dr. Whedon says, "That evil spirits are 

permitted in some ages of gross wickedness 

to possess men has been the doctrine of the 

Church in all ages, until the cavils of some 

5 



36 SPIKITUALISM. 

modern thinkers, more skeptical than wise, 
brought it in question." — Notes^ Matt, iv, 24. 

It is admitted that the term demon, ap- 
plied by the Greeks to their gods, is the 
same term as that applied by the Jews to 
the spirits that possessed men in the days 
of the Saviour, and that they reckoned the 
Gentile gods among those demons. Christ treats 
them as though they were real possessions. 
He talks to them, and bids them leave the 
persons possessed by them. He was talking 
in the presence of a people who believed in 
these things, and every look, and word, and 
act of the Saviour was calculated to confirm 
them in that belief, whether it was true or 
false ; so that we must infer either the general 
correctness of this belief, or the intention of 
Christ to deceive the people. 

But the llTew Testament writers claim that 
persons possessed of devils were possessed of 
the spirit of Apollo, the heathen oracle ; and 
that the expulsion of the spirit of Apollo 
was the casting out of demons. 



SPIRITUALISM. 67 

Acts xvi, 16, " And it came to pass as we 
went to prayer, a certain damsel possessed 
with a spirit of divination met ns, which 
bronght her masters much gain by sooth- 
saying. The same followed Paul and ns, 
and cried, saying, These men are the serv- 
ants of the most high God, which show 
unto ns the way of salvation. And this did 
she many days. But Paul being grieved, 
turned and said to the spirit, I command 
thee in the name of Jesus Christ to come 
out of her. And he came out the same 
hour." 

This is an important text in the discussion 
of this subject, as it forms a sort of connect- 
ing link between the demoniacal possessions 
described in the New Testament and the 
heathen oracles of profane history. 

There can be no reasonable doubt that 
this woman was possessed. Mr. Barnes says, 
"It is plain that Paul regarded this as a 
case of demoniacal possession and treated it 
accordiiigly." Dr. Clark says, " Had not St. 



68 SPIRITUALISM. 

Luke considered this as a real case of diaholiG 
fossession^ he has made use of the most 
improper language he could choose ; language 
and forms of speech calculated to deceive all 
his readers, and cause them to believe a 
lie." 

This woman was "possessed with a spirit 
of divination," {jpneuma Puthonas,) Dr. Clarke 
translates it, " Having a spirit of Python, or 
of Apollo." This name is not a scriptural 
name, but like other names found in the 
Acts of the Apostles, such as Mercury and 
Jupiter, belongs to the heathen mythology of 
Greece and Rome, and hence we must turn 
to the classic writers of those countries for 
an explanation. Python, or Pythias, was one 
of the names of Apollo, the Grecian god of 
the fine arts, of music, poetry, medicine, and 
eloquence. The temple of this god was at 
Delphi, as we have seen. 

The place where this event occurred (Greece) 
goes far to identify this instance of inspiration 
with the other heathen oracles of Greece, 



SPIRITUALISM. 69 

particularly the Delphic oracle and its Pytho- 
nesses. 

" With this historical explanation, we have 
no difficulty in understanding the circum- 
stances of Paul's miracle in exorcising the 
woman. As the event did not take place 
in Delphi, and as the spirit was called, not- 
withstanding, a spirit of Python, which, accord- 
ing to the Greek idiom, may be as well 
translated a Pythian spirit, we must conclude 
that this woman was possessed in exactly the 
same manner as the Pythoness at Delphi, 
although she was not connected with that 
institution." 

St. Paul meeting a case of this kind at 
Ephesus, we are interested to know how he 
treated it. He commanded the spirit of Apollo 
to come out of her, the damsel : " And he came 
out the same hour." If this was not a real 
possession, we repeat, Paul was the greater 
juggler of the two. There Js not the most 
distant intimation that there was any differ- 
ence of opinion between Paul the Jewish 



70 SPIRITUALISM. 

Christian, and the Philippian Greeks inter- 
ested in this case. Panl, addressing the 
spirit, said, "Come out of her^ and he came 
out." When he speaks of the damsel, he 
uses the feminine lier ; but when he speaks 
of the spirit, he employs the masculine Tie^ 
clearly showing that they were entirely dis- 
tinct from each other. 

Here we find Paul coming directly in con- 
tact with one who was possessed, according 
to the belief of the Greeks, of the spirit of 
Apollo ; and, according to the belief of the 
Jews, of the devil, or of a demon. Paul 
disposes of the case so as to convince the 
Greeks, or Gentiles, that they were not mis- 
taken as to its being a real possession; and 
to convince the Jews that they were not 
mistaken as to the real character of the 
demon. 

Here is the proof that the demons of the 
New Testament, and the demons that pos- 
sessed the mediums of Apollo, were one and 
the same. This text is the connecting link, 



SPIRITUALISM. 71 

uniting the sorcery of the ancients witli the 
demonology of the Sayionr's day. 

Take the case of Simon Magus, (Acts viii 
9, 10.) He is said to have bewitched the 
people of Samaria by the use of sorcery. 

Sorcerers, we have before seen, are "those 
who profess to call up the dead ;" " those who 
consult evil spirits." It is, says "Webster, " divi- 
nation by the assistance, or supposed assistance, 
of evil spirits, or the power of commanding evil 
spirits." Here is a case similar to the one last 
named, only there is no evidence that Simon 
was dispossessed of the demon. 

Justin Martyr, speaking of Simon, says : 

" After the ascension of our Lord into heaven, 
certain men were suborned by demons as their 
agents, who said that they were gods. Simon, 
a certain Samaritan of the village called Gi- 
thon, one of the number who, in the reign of 
Claudius Cesar, performed many magic rites 
by the operation of demons, was considered a 
god in the imperial city of Rome, and was hon- 
ored with a statue as a god. ... A certain 



72 SPIRITUALISM. 

Helen, also, is of this class, who had before been 
a public prostitute in Tyre of Phenicia, at 
that time attached herself to Simon, and was 
called the first idea that proceeded from him." — 
JEuselius^ p. 63. 

In this case, as in the one last named, the 
apostles recognize the existence of demons in 
those claiming to be inspired by Apollo. This 
being established, we need not identify the phe- 
nomena, as we have clearly shown that ancient 
sorcery and modern Spiritualism are identical. 

We will, however, present a description of a 
New Testament demon, from the pen of Dr. 
Olshausen, the German commentator. In his 
notes on the "Demoniac of Gadara," we find 
the following description of persons thus pos- 
sessed : 

" In the first place, the condition of the de- 
moniacs appears always to suppose a certain de- 
gree of moral delinquency ; yet so that their sin 
manifests itself, not so much in wickedness, 
properly speaking, as predominant sensuality, 
(probably lasciviousness in particular,) which 



SPIEITUALISM. 73 

was indulged in opposition to their better self. 
. . . Next, there appears, as a characteristic of 
demoniacs, a weakening of the bodily organiza- 
tion, particularly the nervous system. . . . But, 
again, our view is in accordance with the cir- 
cumstance that, in the descriptions of the de- 
moniacs, we often find a subjection of the nerv- 
ous system, and with this, of the voluntary 
bodily functions, especially language, to the will 
of the demons. They speak their character, or 
rather the demon speaks through them, but al- 
ways so that there appears at moments the con- 
sciousness of their individuality. This state is 
quite parallel with the trance, or being in the 
spirit, and speaking with tongues. And, lastly, 
we discover also in the demoniacs an enhanced 
faculty of foreseeing, a kind of somnambulic 
clairvoyance. ... At one time they manifest a 
deep insight into truth ; at another, crude pop- 
ular notions are mixed up in their words, so 
that their conversation has the fearfully vivid 
character of the erring and confused talk of 
madmen, who not imfrequently give utterance 



74 SPIEITUALISM. 

to striking thoughts, but so connected with the 
other elements that the splendor of the thought 
is only a more melancholy testimony of the 
greatness of the derangement in the seat of life, 
whence it issues." 

No one can fail to see a correct portrait of 
Spiritualism here. The reader will do well to 
consult Olshausen's Notes on Matt, viii, 28-34, 
covering some fifteen pages of volume one, be- 
ginning with page 359. 

We think we have now shown that modem 
Spiritualism is not only Greek and Roman sor- 
cery, but New Testament demonology. There 
cannot be found one important point in which 
they difier. This being the case, what is to be 
thought of this boasted new dispensation of 
Spiritualism ? "What is to be thought of intelli- 
gent men going back to Greek and Roman idol- 
atry, and uniting with New Testament demons 
in "What have we to do with thee, Jesus, thou 
Son of God?" Is it not true, that men "love 
darkness rather than light ?" 



SPIKITUALISK 75 



CHAPTEE IV. 

MODEEN" WITCHCRAFT. 

The witclicraft wMcb. prevailed to an alarming 
extent in Europe during the fifteenth and six- 
teenth centuries was nothing more than the 
cropping out of Spiritualism, as we shall be able 
to show. 

If the reader has not taken special pains to 
investigate the subject, he may be startled by 
the facts presented, especially the extent to 
which it prevailed, and its marked likeness to 
Spiritualism. 

WITCHCRAFT ON THE CONTLSTENT. 

During the latter part of the fourteenth cen- 
tury special warrants were from time to time 
issued in behalf of appointed inquisitors, author- 
izing them to visit those provinces of Germany, 
France, and Italy, where any report concerning 



76 SPIRITUALISM. 

sorcery had alarmed the public mind ; and said 
commissioners, proud of the trust reposed in 
them, used their utmost exertion, that the se- 
verity of the tortures inflicted might wring the 
truth from all suspected persons, until they ren- 
dered the provinces in which they exercised 
their jurisdiction a desert from which the in- 
habitants fled. It would be impossible to credit 
the extent of the slaughter, had not some of the 
inquisitors themselves been reporters of their 
own judicial exploits. The same hand which 
signed the sentence recorded the execution. 
(Sir W. Scott.) 

As early as 1398, the University of Paris, in 
laying down rules for the judicial prosecution 
of witches, expressed regret that the crime was 
growing more frequent than in any former age. 

It is said that the first appearance of sorcery 
was in IsTarbonne, in the South of France. It 
soon reached Paris, Italy, Germany, and finally 
spread over all the continent. 

Pope John XXII. complains bitterly, in 1317, 
that a number of his courtiers, and even his own 



SPIRITUALISM. • 77 

physician, had given themselves over to the 
devil, and had conjured evil spirits into rings^ 
circles^ etc., in order to influence men both at a 
distance and also near at hand. Ten years 
later, the same pope complained of the unholy 
tendency of men toward the magic arts. He 
says that many have made a compact with hell, 
and demand of the demons speech and answer. 
(History of Magic, vol. ii, pp. 153, 154.) 

In 1404, a synod was held at Langres, for the 
purpose of devising means for checking the 
progress of sorcery. 

In 1484, Pope Innocent YIII. issued a bull 
against the Germans, in which he accuses them 
of sorcery. He says, " It has come to our ears 
that numbers of both sexes do not avoid to have 
intercourse with infernal fiends, and that by 
their sorceries they afflict both man and beast." 
The pope expresses his grief that in " Germany, 
particularly in Upper Germany, Salzburg, and 
Mainz, Cologne, Trier, and Bremen, many had 
fallen away from the Catholic faith, and mingled 
with demons and paramour-devils." 



78 ♦ SPIKITUALISM. 

The inquisitors were ordered to " convict, im- 
prison, and pnnisli." 

This bull was enforced by the successive bulls 
of Alexander YI., (1494,) Leo X., (1521,) and 
Adrian VI., (1522.) 

In 1491, Florimond, a Frenchman, wrote a 
work on antichrist, in which he says, " All those 
who have offered us some signs of the approach 
of antichrist agree that the increase of sorcery 
and witchcraft is to distinguish the melancholy 
period of his advent ; and was ever age afflicted 
with them as ours? The seats destined for 
criminals, before our judicatories, are blackened 
with persons accused of this guilt. There are 
not judges enough to try them. Our dungeons 
are gorged with them. No day passes that we 
do not render our tribunals bloody by the dooms 
which we pronounce, or in which we do not re- 
turn to our homes discontented and terrified at 
the horrible contents of the confessions which it 
has been our duty to hear. And the devil is 
accounted so good a master that we cannot com- 
mit so great a number of his slaves to the flames 



SPIRITUALISM. 79 

but what there shall arise from their ashes a 
number sufficient to supply their places." — Sir 
W. ScoU. 

The extent of the executions for sorcery is 
quite incredible. In Germany alone, not less 
than one hundred thousand suffered death at the 
hands of the executioner. Whole provinces are 
said to have been depopulated, that no sorcerer 
or witch might escape. 

In 1485, large but unknown numbers suf- 
fered in Berlin. The same year, one hund- 
red are named who were executed at Piedmont. 

In 1488, one thousand were executed at 
Constance. 

In 1515, five hundred were burned at Geneva 
in three months. During the same year, forty- 
eight were burned at Eavensburg. 

In 1524, one thousand were executed at 
Como; and one hundred a year for several 
years afterward. 

No less than nine hundred females suffered 
death at the hands of the executioner at Lor- 
raine. 



80 SPIRITUALISM. 

In 1580, large numbers were executed in 
Spain. 

In 1682, several were executed in Portugal, 
and eighteen are named wlio suffered at 
Avignon. 

Sweden was visited about the same time 
with the dreaded scourge. The king con- 
fessed that his " judges and commissioners 
had caused divers men, women, and children 
to be burned and executed, on such pregnant 
evidence as was brought before him." 

In France, sorcery had become so common 
in 1594, that it is said, " The jails were not 
sufficient to contain the prisoners, nor had they 
judges enough to try them." Triscala told the 
king (Charles IX.) that in 1520 there were 
many thousands in his kingdom. 

In 1431, that world-renowned heroine, Joan 
of Arc, after her wonderful military exploit 
at the siege of Orleans, was burned for witch- 
craft, by order of the Earl of Bedford. 

Many innocent persons were, without doubt, 
accused^ convicted, and executed. We can- 



SPIKITUALISM. 81 

not doubt but the person last named was of 
this elass. Our object is not so much to prove 
the guilt or innocence of the vast numbers 
executed for the crime of sorcery or witchcraft, 
as it is to show the extent to which it pre- 
vailed. These facts will give the reader some 
idea of the extent to which spirit-commerce 
prevailed on the continent during the fifteenth 
and sixteenth centuries. The picture is a sad 
one, but nevertheless true. 

SOECEKY m ENGLAKD AND SCOTLAND. 

The English were sorely afflicted with sor- 
cery. It affected all classes, the ignorant and 
the learned, the rich and the poor, the high 
and the low. 

Bishop Jewell, in a sermon preached before 

Queen Elizabeth, in 1558, addresses her thus : 

^' It may please your grace to understand that 

witches and sorceries, within these last four 

years, are marvelously increased within your 

grace's realm. Tour subjects pine away even 

6 



82 SPIEITUALISM. 

nnto death ; their color fadeth, their speech is 
benumbed, their senses are bereft." 

The laws of England, down to the fifteenth 
century, against witches, were as severe as they 
were on the continent. Afterward simple 
witchcraft was not punished, except in cases 
where other crimes were committed in con- 
nection with it ; in such cases it suffered the 
full penalty of the law. For instance, the 
obtaining and circulating pretended prophecies 
from those -po^se^dng familiar spirits^ if they 
had a tendency to unsettle the state, or en- 
danger the king's title, were crimes severely 
punished. 

The charge against Edmond Hartley was, 
" that he had made the magic circle for conju- 
ration." He claimed to be a healing medium. 

Not less than thirty thousand persons were 
executed in England for the crime of sorcery 
and witchcraft; among the number were the 
Duke of Buckingham, the Dutchess of Glouces- 
ter, the Maid of Kent, Lord Hungerford, and 
others of like character. 



SPIKITUALISM. 83 

The Scotcli were as much, afflicted with sor- 
3ery as the English were. We are informed, 
on good authority, that many persons were 
burned, many transported, and many imprison- 
ed. During a very brief time, it is said, more 
than four thousand were executed. 

In 1563, the following statute, under which 
all witch trials were subsequently conducted 
in Scotland, was enacted. The estates enacted 
that "no person taken upon hand to use any 
manner of witchcraft, sorcery, or necromancy, 
nor give themselves forth to have any such 
craft or knowledge thereof, therethrough abus- 
ing the people ; that no person seek any help, 
response, or consultation, or any such uses or 
abuses of witchcraft, under pain of death." — 
Chambers's Domestio Annals of Scotland, 

With regard to the extent of witchcraft in 
Europe during the time of which we write 
Dr. Dick says : " Europe was little better than 
a large suburb or outwork of Pandemonium, 
one half of the people either bewitching or 
bewitched." 



84 SPIRITUALISM. 

Dr. Hutchinson says, that " during one cen- 
tury, from 14845 there were more witches 
executed than had been from the beginning 
of the world nnto then." 

The business-like manner in which they 
executed witches in Scotland may be inferred 
from the following items, the burning of two 
witches : 

For ten loads of coals to burn them .£3 68 

For a tar barrel 14 

For harden to be jumpers for them 3 10 

For making of them 8 

For one to go to Finmouth for the laird to sit upon 

their assize as judge 6 

For the executioner for his pains 8 16 

For his expenses here 16 4 

We have considered the extent of Spiritual- 
ism briefly; let us proceed to examine its 
phenomena. We believe that the sorcery and 
witchcraft of the times of which we write 
were the Spiritualism of our day, and that 
their identity can be clearly shown. 

Whoever reads up the history of those times 
will be struck with the fact, that females were 
the most remarkable mediums then, as every 



SPIKITUALTSM. 85 

one knows- them to be now. Historians all 
agree in this. 

Eoger BuUingbrook was executed in 1441 
for informing the Duchess of Gloucester how 
long the king would live. 

The Maid of Kent, it is said, fell into strange 
trances, and uttered unusual discourses. The 
persons who heard her thought her possessed 
of supernatural power. 

The account given by Hutchinson of the 
conversation between Miss Throgmorton, and 
Pluck, Hardname, Catch, Blue, and the three 
Smacks, strikingly reminds us of a modern 
medium conversing with the spirits of the dead. 
She falls into a doze, and declares that such 
a sleep has something of paradise in it. She 
falls into fits, and strange, unusual postures, etc. 
The account given of Meikle John Gibb 
and his followers, looks to the same relation- 
ship. They burn their Bibles in the more- 
lands, as an act of solemn adherence to their 
new faith. Gibb is transported to America, 
where he is long venerated by the natives fojf 



86 SPIKITUALISM. 

his familiar converse with, the devil. The 
whole accoimt is but a picture of Spiritualism. 

The mediums when in the trance state be- 
came insensible to external objects. There 
were dancing mediums among them, as we find 
them now. They professed to work miracles. 
They claimed to foretell future events and cure 
diseases. 

Pordage, an English preacher and physician 
of Cromwell's time, was a remarkable leader 
in Spiritualism. He set the inner vision above 
everything. He established a society, which 
he named the ^^Philadelphian Society." There 
was a large society gathered, finally known as 
the '^ Angelic Brethren." Pordage claimed to 
have intercourse with spirits. They went in 
and out of his chamber, seen, not only by him- 
self, but by his wife. 

In their meetings the members fell into 
ecstacies, in which they saw visions of heaven 
and hell, of angels and devils. Such scenes 
were of daily occurrence in their meetings, 
f bey said spirits pass before them, througl? 



SPIRITUALISM. 87 

tliQ. outward sight with the inward eye. Evil 
and good spirits everywhere mixed together. 

Jane Lead, a member of Pordage's society, 
and a very remarkable medium, published 
a number of volumes, containing revelations 
from the spirit-land. The titles of some of 
her works may give the reader some idea of 
their contents : " Clouds," " The Revelation of 
Eevelations," " The Laws of Paradise," " An 
Embassy to the Philadelphian Society," etc. 

A daughter of a Protestant clergyman is 
said to have had visions, transports, and com- 
munion with spirits, with her eyes open and 
closed, by night and by day. Such were the 
wonderful visions seen, and prophecies uttered, 
that Bohemia and Germany were kept in a 
state of excitement for a long time. 

Peter Apon, of Padua, claimed to have been 
taught the seven learned arts by spirits from 
the spirit-world. 

The blind conjuror of Paris pretended to 
deal only with good angels. 

T|ie §B?i'<sy dei»OT]iac wa^ simply a dancing 



88 SPIRITUALISM. 

medium. He said lie had given his soul to 
the devil, that he might be the best dancer 
in Lancashire. He could talk Latin, though 
ignorant of the language. He was able to 
relate matters at a distance of which he had 
no knowledge. He was accustomed to go to 
a certain place to converse with a spirit. 

The devils are said to have played all kinds 
of beautiful pieces of music on the harp. 
(History of Magic, vol. ii, p. 180.) 

The nuns of Loudun, who are reported as 
doing so many wonders, such as speaking lan- 
guages, revealing secrets, writing miraculously, 
etc., were simply spiritualistic mediums. 

Agnes Sympson, in 1599, confessed to King 
James that she was a healing medium. 

Nostrodamus, a French physician, was the 
author of a large book of prophecies, the pro- 
ductions professedly of spirits. 

In 1576, Bessie Dunlop, of Dairy, was accused 
of sorcery, witchcraft, and abuse of the people. 
She professed to tell of coming illness, and 
where lost goods could be found. 



SPIRITUALISM. 89 

Her judges inquired of her by what art she 
could make such disclosures. Now mark her 
reply. She said, of herself, she had no knowl- 
edge or science of such matters, but that 
when questioned concerning such matters she 
was in the habit of applying to one Thomas 
Reid, who had been killed at the battle of 
Pinkie, November 10, 1547, as he himself 
affirmed, and that he resolved her any questions 
which she asked him. 

She seems to have been a seeing medium, as 
she described his general appearance and dress 
with great minuteness. 

Her first interview with Eeid was at a season 
of deep affliction. He informed her where 
stolen goods could be found. He also informed 
her what remedies to administer to the sick. 
Many remarkable cases of cure are reported, 
under Eeid's directions, all going to prove 
that she was a seeing and healing medium, 
equal to those of our day, who claim to be 
in communication with the spirits of the dead. 

Alison Pearson, of Byrehill, was executed in 



90 SPIEITUALISM. 

1588 for invoking the spirit of the devil in 
the person of one William Sympson, her cousin, 
who she affirmed was a great doctor of medi- 
cine. He taught her what remedies to use, and 
how to apply them. 

So much confidence had the people in her 
skill to heal, that the Archbishop of St. An- 
drews, created by James YI., actually took 
her prescriptions and was cured. 

This medium is said to have had continual 
visions, both sleeping and waking. In these 
visions she claimed to be associated with the 
queen of the elves, or spirits. 

l^eed we say more to convince the candid 
reader that here is a full length portrait of 
modern spiritualism ? It is the same in its 
mediums and phenomena. Hence the oft- 
repeated declaration of spiritualists, that its 
present development is something new under 
the sun, and Judge Edmonds's " New Dispen- 
sation," etc., is proved baseless. It is the old 
dispensation of hell not yet abrogated. 

Our authorities agr^e in fixing the tlv^^ of 



SPIRITUALISM. 91 

its cMef prevalence, namely, during the fifteenth 
and sixteenth centuries. 

The reader will remember the testimony ot 
the University of Paris, that in 1398 the crime 
was growing more frequent than in any former 
age ; also the statement of Florimond, that in 
1491 no age was so mnch afflicted as that. 
Then, in 1691, Eev. Robert Kirk, a Scottish 
minister of the Highlands, wrote a book, in 
which he describes the acts of demons, who 
possessed persons in his day, he says, to some 
extent, but more in the past. By these facts 
we see that it prevailed generally, in connection 
with the Reformation under Luther, and most 
extensively in Germany, where Luther labored. 
This I regard as a significant fact in the history 
of this strange movement. 

What is there in modern Spiritualism not 
found in the sorcery and witchcraft of the 
fifteenth and sixteenth centuries? 

Does Spiritualism boast of a multiplicity of 
mediums? They could boast of the cursing 
medium, and the blessing medium; of the 



92 SPIRITUALISM. 

medium of art, and the medium of compact ; 
the active medium, and the passive medium ; 
the developed medium^ and the undeveloped 
medium. 

Does Spiritualism boast of seeing mediums ? 
So could they. 

Does Spiritualism boast of healing mediums ? 
They could point you to the cures effected. 

Does Spiritualism boast of speaking mediums ? 
They could speak as fluently. 

Does Spiritualism boast of v^riting mediums ? 
They could also point you to numerous volumes 
dictated, professedly, by the spirits of the unseen 
world. 

Does Spiritualism boast of musical mediums ? 
They could sing and play as sv^eetly. 

Does Spiritualism boast of dancing mediums ? 
So could thev. 

Does Spiritualism arrogate to itself prophetic 
povf^er ? They claimed the same. 

Does Spiritualism claim to be able to accurate 
ly describe events transpiring at a distance 
They did the same. 



SPIRITUALISM. 93 

Finally, Does Spiritualism claim to be in 
constant communication with tlie spirit-world? 
This was also their constant boast. 

Tell me^ then, is not the Spiritualism of the 
nineteenth, the sorcery and witchcraft of the 
fifteenth and sixteenth centuries? Are they 
not members of the same family ? Have they 
not all one father? 

Spiritualists would have us believe that the 
marshaled hosts of the imseen world are in- 
vading our earth for the first time. 

" Spiritualism," says the '' Banner of Light," 
January 18, 1862, " is the dawn of a new era, 
to be marked by a complete and radical change 
in all things ; to introduce a new condition of 
society upon the earth, with a new religion, a 
new state, and a new order of men and women. 
As such, we should announce and dissemi- 
nate it." 

But we have shown that Spiritualism was 
more rampant and widespread during the 
fifteenth and sixteenth centuries than in our 
day. It is only the resurrection of the old 



94 SPIRITUALISM. 

witchcraft of tlie past, upon whicli the verdict 
of the ages has been pronounced. 

For the sake of morality, intelligence, and 
the honor of humanity, let not that corrupt 
and ignoble form be exhumed from its sleep 
of ages ; for in the plain old Saxon of the 
Bible, "by this time it stinketh." 



SPIRITUALISM. 95 



CHAPTEE Y. 
sIlem witohceaft. 

That diabolical influence wMcli swept over 
Europe, producing terrible havoc among all 
classes, resulting in the death of hundreds of 
thousands of human beings, made its appear- 
ance in New England about the latter part of 
the seventeenth century, under the well known 
name of " Salem Witchcraft." 

We have been inclined to laugh at the 
ghostly credulity of the authorities of Salem. 
But after giving the history of that period a 
careful perusal, I confess I have no disposition 
to make myself merry at their expense. Few 
persons who have not taken special pains to 
investigate that chapter in the history of New 
England, have a just conception of its real 
character. 

Dr. Bently, in his " History of Salem," says. 



96 SPIRITUALISM. 

" From March to August, 1692, was the most dis- 
tressing time Salem ever knew ; business was in- 
terrupted, the town was deserted, terror was in 
every countenance, and distress in every heart. 
Fear haunted every street, melancholy dwelt in 
silence in every place after the sun retired." 

Judge Story, in a discourse delivered at 
Salem, September 18th, 1828, says : " But surely 
our ancestors had no special reasons for shame 
in-* a belief which had the universal sanction of 
our own and former ages, which counted in 
its train philosophers as well as enthusiasts, 
which was graced by the learning of pre- 
lates as well as by the countenance of kings ; 
which the law supported by its mandates, 
and the purest judges felt no compunctions in 
enforcing." 

But it must be remembered that Salem was 
not the first place in which it made its appear- 
ance in New England. Some time before 1692 
men and women were condemned and executed 
for the crime of witchcraft in various towns in 
JSew England. Margaret Jones was executed 



SPIBITUALISM. 97 

for this crime in Charlestown, Mass., in 1648. 
A woman in Dorchester, another in Cambridge, 
and another in Boston, were executed for the 
same crime. Some time after this, two or three 
were executed in Springfield, and one in Hart- 
ford. These were all executed before 1665. 
Between this last period and 1689, Mr. and Mrs. 
Greenwood, Mary Johnson, and Miss Gover, of 
Boston, were executed. 

These cases of condemnation and execution 
had prepared the public mind for the wonderful 
outbreak at Salem, which occurred in 1692, and 
which filled many a New England home with 
sorrow. It manifested itself in Salem, in Feb- 
ruary, 1692, in the family of Rev. Mr. Parris, 
the settled minister of the town. His daughter 
Elizabeth, about nine, and his niece, Abigail 
"Williams, about twelve years old, and Ann 
Putnam, a young female in the town, were the 
first to be afflicted. Such was their conduct as 
to induce physicians to pronounce them be- 
witched. 

Sarah Good, Sarah Osborn, and Tituba, an 

7 



98 SPIRITUALISM. 

Indian woman residing in Mr. Parris's family, 
were supposed to be the witches. These per- 
sons were supposed to have made an actual, 
deliberate and formal compact with the devil, 
to become his faithful subjects and do what they 
could to promote his cause. They were sup- 
posed to be capable of doing anything that the 
devil could do. An almost indefinite amount 
of supernatural ability was supposed to result 
from this diabolical compact. From this simple 
beginning it spread with fearful rapidity over 
all New England. On the 11th of March, Mr. 
Parris invited several ministers in the neighbor- 
hood to unite with him in holding a solemn fast 
at his house, that by prayer to God the evil 
might be removed from his family. Tituba, 
Mr. Parris's Indian woman, was complained of 
first, as being a witch. 

A court, consisting of seven judges, was 
formed for trying the accused. Their names 
were: Lieutenant-Governor Stoughton, Major 
Saltonstall, Major Richards, Major Gidny, Mr. 
Wait Winthrop, Oapt. Sewall, and Mr. Sar- 



SPIRITUALISM. 99 

geant. Their first meeting was at tlie court- 
house in Salem, June 2, 1692. 

There were presented before this honorable 
court about two hundred persons accused of 
the crime of witchcraft. Fifty-five escaped 
death by confessing the crime ; one hundred 
and fifty were imprisoned, twenty were exe- 
cuted, and eight others were condemned to 
death, but subsequently released. 

The names and residence of the accused, and 
the date and manner of their death, (all occur- 
ring in the year 1692,) are as follows : 

Bridget Bishop, of Salem, hanged, June 
10th; Sarah Good and Rebecca Nurse, of 
Salem, Susanna Martin, of Amesbury, Elizabeth 
How, of Ipswich, and Sarah Wilder, of Tops- 
field, were hanged July 10th ; Eev. George 
Burroughs, of Wells, Maine, and former min- 
ister of Salem, John Proctor, John Willard, and 
George Jacobs, Sen., of Salem, and Martha 
Carrier, of Andover, were hanged August 19th; 
Giles Cory, of Salem, refusing to be put upon 
his trial, and pleading " not guilty " to the 



100 SPIRITUALISM. 

indictment, was pressed to death, September 
16tli; Martha Cory, Alice Parker, and Ann 
Pndeater, of Salem, Mary Easty^ of Topsfield, 
Margaret Scott, of Eowley, William Eeed, of 
Marblehead, Samnel War dwell and Mary 
Parker, of Andover, were hanged September 
22d. Here ended the execution of witches in 
Salem and New England. 

That a very marked reaction should have 
taken place, after such an intense excitement 
and nnjnstiflable sacrifice of life, for causes 
which they did not seem to understand, was 
very natural. The judges made a long and 
humble confession of injustice done the accused. 
They implored pardon of the surviving suffer- 
ers, and of God, through Jesus Christ, that they 
might be accepted and the land saved from the 
curse which their sins merited. One stands 
up in a Boston meeting-house while his confes- 
sion is being read. He earnestly solicits the 
prayers of the people of God for himself, his 
family, and a land in mourning. The minister 
of Salem, Eev. Mr. Parris, confesses his error. 



SPIKITUALISM. 101 

But the good people will no longer consent to 
listen to his ministrations, and he is obliged to 
retire. 

Men who had little faith in spiritual things, 
began to 'write and publish refutations of the 
witch mania. They took, generally, the oppo- 
site extreme. Robert Calef, a merchant in 
Boston, published a work on the subject, enti- 
tled, " More Wonders of the Invisible World," 
which Cotton Mather calls a "yile volume," 
and Dr. Increase Mather, then president of 
Harvard College, ordered to be burnt in the 
college-yard, as a "wicked book." It must be 
confessed that Mr. Calef 's book is a little one- 
sided on the subject, and was evidently intended 
to deal a heavier blow against the Mathers than 
against witchcraft. It is claimed that Hutch- 
inson, in his " History of Witchcraft," speaks 
with favor of Mr. Calef 's work. But it must 
be remembered that Mr. Hutchinson took the 
same view of witchcraft that Mr. Calef did, 
and it is not strange that he should have been 
prejudiced in his favor. 



102 SPIRITUALISM. 

We cannot dwell longer on the mere history 
of this matter. We come, more especially, to 
consider its phenomena. We shall find, on a 
close examination of these, all or nearly all the 
phenomena of modern Spiritualism. 

The persons who are said to have been 
afflicted were horribly distorted and convulsed. 
Marks of violence were found upon their per- 
sons. Their hands were tied close together 
with cords and they lifted from the earth in the 
presence of a crowd of people. An iron spin- 
dle was wrested from a demon and secured by 
lock and key, and subsequently removed by the 
demon. Good, credible people, gave oath that 
they saw the corner of a sheet torn from a 
specter or demon, by a person assaulted, and 
that a man had his hand nearly wrung off by 
a demon, in an attempt to get possession of it. 
Money was taken by demons and then dropped 
from the air into the hands of the afflicted. 

Of Ann Cole, of Hartford, it is reported that 
when under the influence of demons, "her 
tongue was improved to express things unknown 



SPIRITUALISM. 103 

to herself. Several eminent ministers wrote 
the speeches of the spirits, thns heard in the 
mouth of this Ann Cole." — Magnolia^ vol. ii, 
p. 390. Elizabeth Knap was so under the 
influence oi demons that she knew not what she 
said, and she spoke against godly persons, even 
against her will. Her speech was very remark- 
able. 

The house of William Morse, of Newberry, 
seems as remarkable for spirit manifestations as 
the Fox house at Hydeville. Bricks, sticks, and 
stones were frequently thrown at the house. 
Pieces of wood moved by an unseen hand. A 
long staff danced up and down the chimney, 
and it was as much as two persons could do to 
hold it. An iron crook was violently hm-led 
about by an invisible hand. A chair flew about 
the room and lit upon the table. A chest was 
carried from one place in the house to another. 
Keys flew about the house. What resembled a 
large stone would be thrown upon the bed at 
night. A box, a board, and a bag of hops were 
fhrQ^ji upon the bed. The man of the house 



104 SPIRITUALISM. 

was knocked down by an nnseen hand. An 
ink-horn was violently snatched away, and 
afterwards dropped from the air. A cap was 
pulled from the head of one. A lady going 
down cellar, the trap-door was immediately 
closed after her, and for some time secured 
against her egress. Bed-clothes were pulled 
from the bed and the bed shaken ; chairs 
danced about the room, and what seemed to be 
a human hand was felt upon members of the 
family. A distinct rapping was heard on the 
bedstead, on boards, etc. 

These are only a few of the things which 
happened to this family. 

The house of Mr. G-. "Walton, of Portsmouth, 
was visited with similar phenomena. It is said 
that stones were thrown at and around the house. 
Many articles were hurled about the rooms. 
Stones would even fly upon the table. A spit 
was carried up the chimney and returned, and 
on being touched flew out of the window. Mr. 
Philip Smith, of Hadley, was most wonderfully 
affected. Knockjiigs w^^^ heard about his bed 



SPIRITUALISM. 105 

at night. He spoke with great fluency, and 
in several languages of which he had no 
knowledge. 

The childrpn of John Goodwin, who were 
thought to have been bewitched by Miss Gover, 
of Boston, performed feats of a remarkable 
character. They would pass for some distance 
through the air, as though they were flying. 
They told of some silver plate in a well, of which 
they had no natural means of knowing. They 
could understand conversation in Latin, Greek, 
and Hebrew, of which languages they had no 
knowledge. One of these girls paraphrased the 
31st Psalm in strains that perfectly amazed 
those who listened to her. She also foretold the 
horrible Indian tragedies that would be enact- 
ed in the land, etc. (Magnalia, vol. ii, p. 398.) 

The witches, as they were called, would cry 
out much against godly men and women. Those 
who were the most fluent are said to have been 
the most wicked. " They said they knew not 
what, but were in a preternatural dream.'' 
(Magnalia.) 



106 SPIRITUALISM. 

Persons afflicted could tell of the approach of 
their tormentors, when their eyes were closed 
They were stiff and rigid. Calef reports one 
person who was drawn up to the ceiling. (Let- 
ter I, § 8.) How perfectly does this harmonize 
with the facts of Spiritualism ! 

President Mahan says, "Eev. H. Snow, in 
his work entitled ' Spirit Intercourse,' gives an 
apparently well-authenticated case, in which a 
medium was himself ' raised entirely from the 
floor, and held in a suspended position by the 
same kind of invisible power.' For ourselves, 
we have no disposition to question such a state- 
ment, knowing as we do, that cases perfectly 
similar and analogous are attested by evidence 
which we are compelled to regard as valid." — 
Mod. Mys.^ p. 117. 

In a letter written Oct. 8, 1692, by Thomas 
Brattle, F.K.S., on the subject of the " Salem 
Witchcrafts," and published in the " Collection 
of the Mass. Hist. Society," (1st Series, vol. 5,) 
the author administers a severe rebuke to the 
" Salem gentlemen," as he calls them, for the 



SPIEITUALISM. 107 

manner in which they condemned and executed 
persons for alleged witchcraft ; giving it as his 
opinion, which I think a correct one, that the 
persons who professed to be bewitched were the 
persons who were in league with the devil, and 
not the persons accused by them. He says, " I 
think the matter might be better solved another 
way; but I shall not make any attempt that 
way, further than to say that these afflicted chil- 
dren, as they are called, do hold correspondence 
with the devil even in the esteem and account 
of the S. G., [Salem gentlemen,] for when the 
black man, the devil, does appear to them, they 
ask him many questions, and accordingly give 
information to the inquirer ; and if this is not 
holding correspondence with the devil, I know 
not what is." P. 64. 

This writer further states, that many persons 
brought their sick friends and relatives to these 
afflicted children, to learn the nature of the dis- 
ease with which they were afflicted, not because 
of any ordinary knowledge they might possess, 
but because of "a supernatural knowledge; a 



108 SPIRITUALISM. 

knowledge wMcli they obtain by their holding 
correspondence with specters, or evil spirits, as 
they themselves grant. This consulting of these 
afflicted children, as above said, seems to me to 
be a very gross evil, a real abomination, not fit 
to be known in New England, and yet is a thing 
practiced, not only by Tom and John — I mean 
the ruder and more ignorant sort — ^but by many 
who profess high, and pass among us for some 
of the better sort." P. 70. He further declares 
that some of the "civil leaders and spiritual 
teachers allow of, encourage, yea, and practice 
this very abomination." A person went from 
Boston to Salem to consult these persons with 
regard to his sick child, and did so ; for which 
he was severely reproved by Rev. Increase 
Mather. The doctor wished to know " whether 
there was not a God in Boston, that he should 
go to the devil in Salem for advice." 

Mr. Brattle says, " This consulting of these 
afflicted children about their sick, was the un- 
happy beginning of the unhappy troubles at 
poor Andover." P. 71. 



SPIRITUALISM. 109 

" The afflicted do own and assert," says Mr. 
Brattle, "and the justices do grant, that the 
devil does inform and tell the afflicted the names 
of those persons, that are thns unknown unto 
them." He further says, " It is most certain 
that it is neither Almighty God, nor yet any 
good spirit that gives this information ; and my 
reason is good — ^because God is a God of truth, 
and the good spirits will not lie ; whereas these 
informations have several times proved false, 
when the accused were brought before the af- 
flicted." P. 73. 

Here are some of the facts of the New Eng 
land witchcraft. They are very remarkable, 
and certainly very well authenticated. Cotton 
Mather says, and he was no mean man, and has 
never been accused of dishonesty, " Flashy peo- 
ple may burlesque these things ; but when hun- 
dreds of the most sober people, in a country 
where they have as much mother- wit certainly 
as the rest of mankind, know them to be true, 
nothing but the absurd and froward spirit of 
Sadduceism can question them. I have not yet 



110 SPIRITUALISM. 

mentioned so much as one thing that will not be 
justified, if it be required, by the oaths of more 
considerate persons than any that can ridicule 
these odd phenomena." — Magnolia^ vol. i^p. 187. 

Mr. Thatcher makes a lame effort to disprove 
these facts. His work, on the whole, is a lame 
affair. It opens with a chapter on " Ghosts," 
and concludes with one on "Quackery;" and 
his book should have been entitled " Ghostly 
Quackery." 

Dr. Hutchinson, in reviewing this history, 
gives a false coloring to the whole matter, and 
suppresses some of the most prominent facts. 
Dr. Samson, in his recent work, " Spiritualism 
Tested," gives most of the facts, but attempts to 
account for them on natural principles. In 
order to make good his theory, he represents 
Eev. George Burroughs as a burly, muscular, 
portly, gigantic Englishman ; and Cotton Ma- 
ther a slender, delicate, nervous, thoughtful, re- 
flective, impulsive student. But if Dr. Samson's 
theory rests on the portly, gigantic Burroughs, 
it must have a frail foundation, for he is said by 



SPIRITUALISM. Ill 

Mather to have been a " puny man," and by 
Calef, a " small, black-haired man." How Dr. 
Samson could have magnified this puny, small, 
black-haired Burroughs into a burly, portly, 
gigantic Englishman, is a little diJfficult for us 
to understand. But anything to make good the 
theory. 

We have thus presented a very brief history 
of Salem or New England witchcraft ; and in 
glancing at its phenomena, we have met with 
all the peculiar characteristics of our modern 
Spiritualism. 

Do spiritualists claim to have intercourse with 
spirits ? So did they. 

Do spiritualists claim to reveal future events ? 
So did they. 

Do spiritualists claim to move tables, and turn 
up things generally ? So did they. 

Do spiritualists claim to pronounce wonderful 
discourses by the aid of invisible spirits ? So 
did they. 

Do spiritualists claim to produce rappings by 
the aid of unseen agents ? So did they. 



112 SPIRITUALISM. 

Do spiritualists profess to speak in an un- 
known tongue ? So did they. 

Do spiritualists profess to heal the sick by 
prescriptions from the spirit world? So did 
they. 

Do spiritualists claim to be the opponents of 
the Christian religion ? So did they. 

Do spiritualists proclaim against the Bible ? 
So did they. 

Stripped of all the foolish notions peculiar to 
that age, JSTew England witchcraft stands before 
us the younger brother of ancient demonology, 
and the elder brother of modern Spiritualism. 



SPIRITUALISM. 113 



CHAPTER VI. 

THE SPIRIT OF MASCON AND THE EPWORTH 
RAPPINGS. 

I PROPOSE giving in this chapter two very 
marked and well-attested developments of 
Spiritualism; one occurring in Mascon, Bur- 
gundy, and the other in Epworth, England. 
The latter of these accounts is familiar to many ; 
the former, though equally well attested, is not 
so generally known. It is entitled, "A True 
Relation of the Chief Things which an Evil 
Spirit did and said at Mascon in Burgundy." 
The wonderful things here narrated occurred in 
the house of Eev. Mr. Perreaud, minister of the 
Reformed Church in Mascon. He seems tc 
have been a very pious and intelligent man. 
" The pastors and elders of the Reformed 
Churches of the province of Burgundy, as- 

sembled in a synod at Bussy, in the'balliage of 

8 



114 SPIRITUALISM. 

Clialoiis-upon-Stone, certify to all, that Mr. Per 
reaud, minister of the Gospel, exercised the 
charge of the holy ministry in this province for 
the space of fifty years ; first in his own town of 
Bussy, where he was born, being descended of 
the most ancient family of the town, and since 
in the Church of Mascon, and afterward in the 
Chnrches of the balliage of Gez : in all that time, 
and in all these Churches doing the ofiice of a 
good pastor and a faithful servant of God, both 
in doctrine and life; of which he had an es- 
pecial testimonial given him by the Church of 
Mascon in the year 1649, the said Church ex- 
pressing much satisfaction of his godliness and 
singular charity." They further add, that, " it 
hath pleased God to bring him into many, and 
some very extraordinary trials, especially while 
he served the Church of Mascon, yet the same 
God hath strengthened him with constant health 
of body and godly tranquillity of mind, and hath 
endued him with virtue to bear and overcome 
all his afflictions," etc. 
The account will be given in an abridged 



SPIRITUALISM. 115 

form from a translation made by Peter du 
Molin, at the request of Sir Eobert Boyle, 
and cliiefly in the language of Mr. Perreand. 
Mr. Perreaud informs us that on the 14th 
of September, 1612, he went to Couches, with 
one of the elders of the Church of Mascon, 
to attend a meeting, and was absent five days. 
On his return he found his wife and maid in a 
very great consternation, apparent in their 
coimtenance. He asked the cause of it. His 
wife informed him that the night after he went 
from town, being in bed and asleep, she was 
aroused by something which drew her curtain 
with great noise and violence. The maid, 
sleeping in the same room, being aroused by 
the noise, hastily ran to her mistress to inquire 
the cause. All being quiet, she retired. The 
next night the maid occupied the same bed 
with her mistress. No sooner were they com- 
fortably in bed than they felt something draw 
off the blankets. The maid, attempting to go 
out of the room, found the door bolted both 
within and without. She called a young man in 



116 SPIKITUALISM. 

another room, who arose and opened the door. 
Lighting a candle, she found the pewter and 
brass thrown about the kitchen. The next 
night the spirit made a great noise among the 
pewter and brass ; also, a noise resembling the 
hiving of bees. 

Mr. Perreaud hearing these relations was not 
a little amazed ; yet he resolved that he would 
not be too credulous, nor yet too incredulous. 
" Wherefore,'' he says, " before I went to bed I 
carefully searched all the corners of the house, 
and set bolts and barricadoes to all the doors 
and windows, stopping even the very cat-holes, 
leaving nothing that might occasion suspicion 
of imposture ; and after I had prayed with my 
family I went to bed, while my wife and maid 
sat spinning by the fire, with a lamp burning on 
the table. 

" I had scarcely got in bed before I heard a 
great noise in the kitchen, as the rolling of a 
billet thrown with great strength. I heard also 
a knocking against a partition of wainscot (that 
is, walls made in panels) in the same kitchen ; 



SPIRITUALISM. 117 

sometimes as witli the point of the fingers ; 
sometimes as with the nails ; sometimes as with 
the fist, and then the blows did redouble. Many- 
things were thrown against the wainscot, such 
as plates, trenchers, and ladles ; music was made 
with a brass colander," etc. Mr. Perreaud, after 
listening to these noises for some time, arose and 
went into the room from which they proceeded, 
the maid holding the light, and searched nar- 
rowly that he might find some one hidden in 
the room. This he did twice, but finding no 
one, returned to his bed. " Then did I know," 
he says, "that all this could not proceed but 
from a wicked spirit." 

The next day Mr. Perreaud informed the elders 
of his Church, and some other worthy men of the 
town, of the strange occurrences at his house. 
They subsequently visited his house every even- 
ing during the continuance of the noises. 

On the 20th of September, in the presence of 
many witnesses, the spirit appeared, and three 
or four times whistled with a very loud and 
shrill tone. It soon framed an articulate voice, 



118 SPIEITUALISM. 

and in a hoarse tone pronounced these words, 
" Two and twenty pence," in a little tune of 
five notes, wLich whistling birds were taught to 
sing. It then pronounced the word " minister" 
many times. Mr. Perreaud replied, " Get thee 
from me, Satan ; the Lord rebuke thee." The 
spirit would repeat the Lord's prayer, the creed, 
the ten commandments, and even sing the 
eighty-first Psalm. It informed Mr. Perreaud 
that his father had been poisoned, and gave the 
place, time, and manner in which it was done, 
Mr. Perreaud says : 

" That very night he said he came from Pais de 
Yaux ; that he had passed through the village of 
AUagmone, at the door of my eldest brother's 
house,^where he had seen him, with M. du Pan, 
Minister of Thoiry ; that they were ready to go 
to supper together at my brother's house. He 
had saluted them, and asked whether they had 
anything to command him to deliver to me, be- 
cause he was going to Mascon." 

Mr. Perreaud states that he had been inform- 
ed by Mr. Du Pan, that at the very time he re- 



SPIRITUALISM, 119 

membered that a man on horseback had spoken 
with them, and such discourse had passed be- 
tween them. The demon also informed them 
of a company that came near being drowned, 
and that Mr. Perreaud's brother was of the 
number. Many other things of like character 
are reported in the account given, and acknowl- 
edged by the parties. The demon spoke of the 
intention of Mr. Perreaud's brother to visit 
him on a given occasion, and the cause of the 
change in his mind. Also, of a quarrel between 
James Berard and Samuel du Mont, which 
nearly resulted in Berard's death. Particulars 
of the quarrel were given, which had not been 
known, but which proved to be true. 

" Another night," says Mr. Perreaud, " the 
demon speaking to one of our company, told 
him such secret things that the man who 
affirmed never to have told them to any per- 
son, came to believe that the devil knew his 
thoughts." 

" Then he began to mock God and all relig- 
ion." The dog of the house, which used to bark 



120 SPIRITUALISM. 

at all noises, was never known to bark during 
these disturbances. 

The demon proposed to make bis will, and 
wished tbem to send for a royal notary. He 
then denied tbat be was tbe same person or 
demon wbo bad spoken to tbem before. He 
sung many profane songs, and counterfeited tbe 
voice of mountebanks, and especially tbe bunts- 
men's cry, " Ho le^orierP 

Speaking of tbose wbo professed tne Eeform- 
ed religion witbin tbe kingdom of France, be 
made tbis exclamation, ^ O, poor Huguenots ! 
you sball bave mucb to suffer witbin a few 
years ! O, wbat mischief is intended against 
you!'" 

Mr. Perreaud says, " As bis words were 
strange, so were his actions ; for besides tbose 
things already related, be did many more of the 
same kind. He frequently tossed about a great 
roll of cloth of fifty ells, which a friend bad left 
at my bouse. Once he snatched a brass candle- 
stick out of the maid's hand, leaving tbe candle 
lighted in her hand. He would often take tbe 



SPIRITUALISM. 121 

maid's coats and hang them over the bedposts. 
Sometimes he would hang at those posts a great 
starching plate, with cords tied with such a num- 
ber of knots, that it was impossible to miloose 
them, and yet himself would untie them in a 
moment," etc. 

" One afternoon a friend of mine visited me. 
We went together into the chamber where the 
demon was most resident. There we found the 
featherbed, blankets, sheets, and bolster, laid on 
the floor. I called the maid to make the bed, 
which she did in our presence. But frequently, 
while we were walking in the same room, we 
saw the bed tumbled down on the floor as it 
was before. 

" In my study, I found several times part of 
my books laid on the floor." 

" We heard," says Mr. Perreaud, " for a long 
time, a harmony not unpleasant, of two bells 
tied together. These were heard in other houses 
in the town. 

His last acts were, throwing stones about the 
house. A stone was one day thrown at Mr. 



122 SPIRITUALISM. 

Tornus, who took it up and marked it with a 
coal, and threw it back again. The stone was 
soon thrown back again, known by the coal 
mark on it. Mr. Tornns taking it up found 
it to be hot, and remarked that he believed it 
had been in hell since he handled it last. 

These are the facts, or a few of the facts con- 
nected with this strange affair. The Bishop of 
Mascon hearing the reports, sent for Mr. Tornus 
to know the truth. He sent also his own secre- 
tary, Mr. Chamber, to Mr. Perreaud, to learn 
the particulars from his own lips. " These two 
gentlemen, Tornus and Chamber, have told me 
since," says Mr. Perrault, "that the bishop had 
heard that story with great admiration, and had 
some records of the same." 

Mr. Wesley published this account in the 
" Arminian Magazine," in 1782, prefaced with 
this remark : 

" I do not think any unprejudiced men can 
doubt the truth of this narrative. The truth of 
it was in the last century acknowledged by all 
Europe; against which the unaccountableness 



SPIRITUALISM. 123 

of it is no objection to those who are convinced 
of the littleness of their own knowledge." 

The famous Robert Boyle, while residing at 
Geneva, became acquainted with Mr. Perreaud, 
and received from him the book from which this 
account is taken, written in French. 

In the following note to Eev, Peter du Molin, 
chaplain to Charles II., and prebendary of Can- 
terbury, requesting its translation into English, 
he says : 

"To THE Rev. and Learisted Friend, Dr. 

Peter du Molest: 

"Dear Sir: — Though I suppose you will 
look upon my sending you Monsieur Perreaud's 
French book as a minding you of the promise 
you were the other day pleased to make me of 
putting it into an English dress, yet I hope you 
will do me the right to believe that if the sub- 
ject were not extraordinary, I should think it 
injurious to the public and to you, to be acces- 
sory to your turning translator of another's 
books, that hath already manifested, in several 



124 SPIRITUALISM. 

languages, how able you are to write excellent 
ones of your own. 

'' I must freely confess to you, that the power- 
ful inclinations which my course of life and 
studies hath given me to backwardness of as- 
sent, and the many fictions which are wont to 
blemish the relation where spirits and witches 
are concerned, would make me very backward 
to contribute anything to your publishing, or 
any man's believing, a story less strange than 
this of Monsieur Perreaud. 

" But the conversation I had with that pious 
author during my stay at Geneva, and the pres- 
ent he was pleased to make me of this treatise 
before it was printed, in a place where I had 
opportunities to inquire both after the writer 
and some passages of the book, did at length 
overcome in me (as to this narrative) all my 
settled indisposedness to believe strange things. 
And since I find that you have received an 
account both of Monsieur Perreaud himself, 
and several things relating to this book, from 
that excellent person, your father, I have no 



SPIRITUALISM. 125 

reason to doubt but that your skill in the tongues 
will bring it tbe greatest advantages that it can 
receive from a translator's pen. So the reputa- 
tion which your and your learned father's name 
will give it, will prove as effectual as anything of 
that nature can be, to make wary readers believe 
even the amazing passages of it. 

" I am, sir, your affectionate friend and humble 
servant, Egbert Boyle." 

The reply to the foregoing, accompanying the 
translation, is somewhat lengthy. I shall insert 
a part of it only. 

" To THE Honorable and most eminent in 
Goodness and Learning-, Mr. Eobert 
Boyle : 

" Sir, — In obedience to the charge which you 
have been pleased to lay upon me, I have trans- 
lated this admirable story, worthy to be known 
of all men. . . „ Many relations are extant of 
manifestations of demons ; the most certain are 
the history of the Gospel, how the devils spake 



126 SPIRITUALISM. 

aloud out of possessed bodies in the presence of 
great multitudes. . . . But no history relates 
such a public, continued, and undeniable mani- 
festation of the wicked spirit as this does. . . . 
For this conversation of the devil was not in a 
corner, or in a desert, but in the midst of a 
great city, in a house where there was daily a 
great consort to hear him speak, and where 
men of contrary religions met together ; whose 
proneness to cast a disgrace upon the dissenting 
parties did occasion the examining and the full 
confirming of the truth thereof, both by the 
magistrates and by the diocesan of the place. 
All these particulars and many more have been 
related to my father, when he was president of 
a national synod in those parts,^by the man that 
was most concerned in them, the author of 
this book, a religious, well poised, and vener- 
able divine, who, (if he be still alive,) is above 
eighty years of age. He wrote this relation 
when it was fresh in his memory ; yet did not 
publish it till forty-one years after, in the year 
1653, being compelled to it by the various and 



SPIKITUALISM. 127 

false relations of that story which were scattered 
abroad. . . . But yourself, sir, had from the 
author a more immediate information, which 
being prefixed before this narrative, gives it 
a free and uncontrollable pass to be admitted 
into the belief of the most severe and judicious 
readers. Neither will they have a less opinion 
of the utility than truth of this relation, when 
they see that a person so high in learning, so 
deep in judgment, so real in godliness, so exem- 
plary in good works, hath judged it to be of 
principal use for the convincing of unbelievers, 
and the confirming of those that are in the faith. 
Thereby also I shall reap this benefit to myself, 
that the world shall know I am honored with 
your commands, and that I delight to approve 
myself, sir, your most humble and obedient 
servant and true honorer, 

Petek du Molin." 

In this account we find many of the develop- 
ments of modern Spiritualism — speaking, rap- 
ping, music, disarranging furniture, throwing 



128 SPIRITUALISM. 

articles about the house, accurately describing 
events at a distance unknown to the parties 
present at the time, etc. 

The next exhibition of Spiritualism, to which 
we call the reader's attention, is known as the 

EPWORTH RAPPESraS. 

These rappings, as they are called, occurred 
in 1716, in the house of Eev. Samuel "Wesley, 
Eector of Epworth parish, England, and father 
of John and Charles Wesley, founders of the 
Methodist denomination. They have occasioned 
no little discussion and speculation for the last 
hundred and forty-five years. They were on 
this wise. 

On the night of Dec. 2, 1716, Mr. Wesley's 
servant, Eobert Brown, and one of the maids 
of the family, were alone in the dining-room. 
About ten o'clock they heard a strong knocking 
on the outside of the door which opened into 
the garden. They at once responded to the call 
by opening the door, but found no one there. 
A second knock was heard, accompanied by a 



SPIEITUALISM. 129 

groan. The door was again and again opened, 
as the knocks were repeated^ but seeing nothing, 
and being a little startled, they quietly retired 
for the night. On Eobert reaching the top of 
the stairs, a hand-mill at a little distance was 
seen to whirl about with great rapidity. On 
beholding the strange sight, he seemed only to 
regret that it had not been full of malt. Strange 
noises were heard in and about his room during 
the night. These were related to another maid 
in the morning only to receive a hearty laugh, 
and, " What a couple of fools are you ! " 

This was the simple beginning of the " Ep- 
worth Eappings." We shall not attempt to 
give them in detail, but merely present some of 
the more important phenomena bearing upon 
our subject. 

Some of the things said to have occurred are 

the following: Knockings were heard on the 

doors, on the bedsteads, and at various times in 

every part of the house by night and by day. 

Mr. Wesley says that his daughters, Susanna 

and Ann, were one evening below stairs, in the 

9 



130 SPIRITUALISM. 

dining-room, and while there heard a knocking, 
first at the door, then over their heads. The 
night after they heard similar knockings under 
their feet, though no person was in the chamber 
in the one case, nor below them in the other. 
He adds, " The like they and my servants heard 
in both the kitchens, at the door against the 
partition and over them." Again, "knocking 
at the foot of the bed and behind it." " We 
heard several lond knocks in our own chamber, 
on my side of the bed." The 21st. "That 
night I was waked a little before one by nine 
distinct very loud knocks, which seemed to be 
in the next room to ours, with a sort of a pause 
at every third stroke." "The next night I 
heard six knocks." Emily heard the knocks on 
the bedstead, and under the bed. " She knocked 
and it answered her." Dec. 26th, when in the 
nursery, "it began with knocking in the kitchen 
underneath, then it seemed to be at the bed's 
feet, then under the bed ; at last at the head of 
it. I went down stairs," says Mr. Wesley, " and 
knocked with my stick against the joists of the 



SPIRITUALISM. 131 

kitchen. It answered me as often and as lond 
as I knocked." Knockings were heard under 
the table, etc. 

latches of doors would move up and down as 
the members of the family approached them. 
The doors were violently thrnst against those 
who attempted to open and shut them. A 
cradle was heard to violently rock, where no 
cradle had been for years. At evening prayer, 
when the rector " began the prayer for the king, 
a knocking began all ronnd the room, and a 
thmidering knock attended the amen." This 
was repeated morning and evening while prayer 
for the king was being offered. Mr. Wesley 
says, " I have been thrice pushed by an invisi- 
ble power, once against the comer of my desk 
in the study, a second time against the door of 
the matted chamber, a third time against the 
right side of the frame of my study door, as I 
was going in." 

Mr. Hoole, vicar of Haxey, an eminently 
pious and sensible man, was sent for to spend a 
few evenings with the family. The knockings 



132 . SPIRITUALISM. 

commenced about ten o'clock in the evening. 
Mr. "Wesley and his friend went into the nursery, 
where the knockings were heard, and found 
them to proceed from the head of the bed in 
which the children were sleeping. Mr. Wesley 
observed that the children, though asleep, were 
very much affected ; they trembled exceedingly 
and sweat profusely ; and becoming very angry, 
he pulled out a pistol, and was about to fire at 
the place from whence the sound came. Mr. 
Hoole caught him by the arm, and said, " Sir, 
you are convinced this is something preternatu- 
ral. If so you cannot hurt it ; but you give it 
p.ower to hurt you." Then going close to the 
place, Mr. Wesley said sternly, " Thou deaf and 
dumb devil, why dost thou fright these children, 
that cannot answer for themselves ? Come to 
me in my study, that am a man." Instantly it 
knocked the rector's knock, (a particular knock 
which he always used at the gate,) as if it would 
shiver the board in pieces." Nothing more was 
heard that night. Up to this time there had 
been no noises heard in the study. " But the 



SPIRITUALISM. 133 

next evening, as he attempted to go into his 
study, (of which none had any key but himself,) 
when he opened the door it was thrust back with 
such violence as had like to have thrown him 
down. Presently there was knocking, j&rst on 
one side, then on the other." 

A sound was heard as if a large iron bell were 
thrown among bottles under the stairs. As 
Mr. and Mrs. Wesley were going down the broad 
stairs, they heard a sound as if a vessel of silver 
were poured upon Mrs. "Wesley's breast, and ran 
jingling down to her feet ; at another time, as 
if all the pewter was thrown about the kitchen, 
though on examination all was found undis- 
turbed. 

The dog, a large mastiff, seemed as much dis- 
turbed by these noises as the family. On their 
approach he would run to Mr. and Mrs. Wesley, 
seeking shelter between them. " While the 
disturbances continued he used to bark and 
leap, and snap on one side and the other, and 
that frequently before any person in the room 
heard any noise at all. But after two or three 



134 SPIRITUALISM. 

days he used to tremble, and creep away before 
the noise began. And by this the family knew 
it was at hand ; nor did the observation ever 
fail." Footsteps were heard in every part of 
the house, which shook it from cellar to garret. 
Groans were repeatedly heard, as from a person 
dying ; and at other times it would " sweep 
through the halls and along the stairs with a 
sound of a person trailing a loose gown on the 
floor, and the chamber walls meanwhile shook 
with vibrations." It frequently responded to 
Mrs. Wesley if she stamped on the floor and 
bade it answer. Whenever it was attributed to 
rats the noises became more loud and fierce. 

Susannah Wesley says: "To my father's no 
small amazement, his trencher [a wooden plate] 
danced upon the table a pretty while, without 
any body stirring the table." 

These disturbances continued for some months 
and then subsided, except that some members 
of the family were annoyed by them, more or 
less, for some years. 

I^r, Wesley w^s repeatedly urged to quit the 



SPIKITUALISM. 135 

house, but his reply was characteristic: "No, 
let the devil flee from me ; I will never flee from 
the devil." 

Every effort was made to discover the cause 
of these strange phenomena, but without any 
satisfactory result, save that all believed them 
to be preternatural, and the work of the devil. 
The whole Wesley family were unanimous in 
this belief. 

Dr. Priestley confessed it to have been " the 
best authenticated and best told story of the 
kind that is anywhere extant; and yet such 
were his materialistic views and feelings that he 
could not find for it what might seem to be a 
common-sense explanation. He thinks it quite 
probable that it " was a trick of the servants, 
assisted by some of the neighbors, and that 
nothing was meant by it besides puzzling the 
family and amusing themselves." But Mrs. 
Wesley and other members of the family state 
that the noises were heard above and beneath 
them, when all the family were in the same 



136 SPIEITUALISM. 

Mr. Soutliey, though he does not express an 
opinion in his Life of Wesley with regard to 
these noises, does say, "The testimony upon 
which it rests is far too strong to be set aside 
because of the strangeness of the relation." He 
subsequently, in a letter to Mr. Wilberforce, 
avows his belief in their preternatural character. 

Dr. Priestley observes, in favor of the story, 
" that all the parties seem to have been suffi- 
ciently void of fear, and also free from credulity, 
except the general belief that such things were 
supernatural." But he claims that where no 
good end is to be answered, we may safely con- 
clude that no miracle was wrought. 

To this Mr. Southey replies: "The former 
argument would be valid if the term miracle 
were applicable to the case ; but by miracle Dr. 
Priestley evidently intends a manifestation of 
divine power, and in the present instance no 
such manifestation is supposed, any more than 
in the appearance of a departed spirit. Such 
things may be preternatural and yet not mirac- 
uloi^s ; they may be laot in the ordinary course 



SPIEITUALISM. 137 

of nature, and yet imply no alteration of its 
laws. And witli regard to the good end which, 
they may be supposed to answer, it would be 
end sufficient if sometimes one of those unhappy 
persons, who, looking through the dim glass of 
infidelity, see nothing beyond this life, and the 
narrow sphere of mortal existence, should, from 
the well-established truth of one such story, 
(trifling and objectless as it might otherwise 
appear,) be led to a conclusion that there are 
more things in heaven and earth than are 
dreamt of in their philosophy." — Soutlieyh Life 
of Wesley^ pp. 24, 25. 

Coleridge found a satisfactory solution of this 
knotty question in attributing the whole thing 
to a contagious nervous disease, with which he 
supposed the whole family to be afflicted, " the 
acme or intensest form of which is catalepsy." 
The poor dog, it seems, was as badly afflicted as 
the rest ! This opinion does not need refutation. 

Dr. Adam Clarke, who collected these ac- 
counts and published them in his Wesley Family^ 
claims that the accounts given of these disturb- 



138 SPIEITUALISM. 

ances are so circumstantial and authentic as to 
entitle them to the most implicit credit. The 
eye and ear witnesses were persons of strong 
understandings and weU-cultivated minds, un- 
tinctured by superstition, and in some in- 
stances rather skeptically inclined. 

Dr. Clarke states that he and others of his 
particular acquaintances had been eye and ear 
witnesses of transactions of a similar kind, which 
could never be traced to any source of trick or 
imposture. 

We have thus traced this spirit-commerce 
from the earliest times until the present. We 
have found little difficulty in identifying it 
in every period of its development. We have 
seen rappings, and trance-speaking, and doc- 
tors of medicine, and a great variety of phys- 
ical phenomena, all in perfect accordance 
with what purports to be a new dispensation, 
just introduced under the name of Modern 
Spiritualism. 

Dr. Hare asks, " Wherefore were not these 
efforts to communicate witfti mankind at an 



SPIRITUALISM. 139 

earlier period of the world's duration ? " and 
then proceeds to argue that the world was not 
prepared for it. He says, " Two hundred years 
ago. Spiritualism would have been as much per- 
secuted as witchcraft." But we have shown 
that the same efforts have been made to com- 
municate with mankind, and that the witchcraft 
of " two hundred years ago is identical with the 
Spiritualism of to-day. There is no important 
point in which they differ." 

"We have found the developments of Spiritual- 
ism to be periodical. If the reader will mark 
well this fact, he may find less difficulty in de- 
termining its true character. There have been 
isolated cases in all ages, but the general out- 
breaks have been in connection with some great 
religious movement, coming immediately before 
and accompanying the same. 

It seems to have made its appearance in an 
unusual manner just about the time the Son of 
God was revealed to destroy the works of the 
devil. After the ascension, we find it gradually 
waning until we lose sight of it almost entirely. 



140 SPIRITUALISM. 

About tlie time of the Reformation, it burst 
upon Europe with unusual power ; and wherever 
the Reformation spread, this unholy influence 
preceded and accompanied it, professing to be 
hostile to it. 

Just before the " Great Awakening " in New 
England, we witness the terrible outbreak in 
Salem, and elsewhere in J^ew England. 

In England it majf:es a bold attack on the 
Wesley family, the prominent members of which 
were preparing to be leaders in the most won- 
derful and wide-spread religious movement of 
modern times. 

The recent developments of Spiritualism pre- 
ceded and accompanied one of the most remark- 
able revivals of religion ever known in Europe 
or America. 

Spiritualism evidently belongs to that system 
of Satanic influences which have for the end 
the destruction of Christ's kingdom on earth. 
By its fruits it must be known, and to these 
we shall call the reader's attention in another 
chapter. 



SPIEITUALISM. 141 



CHAPTEE VII. 

GOD'S TESTIMOISTY AGAIISTST SPIEITUALISM. 

" Thebe is, perhaps, no fact within the range 
of biblical science/' says Rev. 0. Mnnger, " in 
which critics are more agreed than in this, 
namely, that the word demon denotes a spiritual 
being, or that demons among the Greeks, Jews, 
and Christians, according to common belief and 
nse, were spirits. . . . There is an entire una- 
nimity among critics, so far as we have examined, 
in the fact named. . . . Whether the spirit is 
human or superhuman, is not so well agreed ; 
neither is it at all material to our argument." 

Without such an admission, so far as the 
Jews are concerned, the practice of Christ and 
his apostles can never be satisfactorily explain- 
ed. If they did not regard the spirits, or de- 
mons, by them cast out, real existences, they in- 
tentionally misled the people. 



142 SPIEITUALISM. 

We have shown that demons among the 
heathen were worshiped as the ghosts of de- 
parted heroes, conqnerors, and potentates, and 
that popular superstition had deified them. 
Many of these demons were supposed to be evil 
spirits, -^hile many of them were held in high 
esteem for their moral virtues. This was the 
heathen view. But the N^ew Testament writ- 
ers invariably use the term to denote evil 
spirits. 

God has regarded the practice of consulting 
the dead with so much displeasure, that he has 
enacted stringent statutes against it. The 
thunderbolts of the divine displeasure are sus- 
pended over our heads at every step we take 
in this direction. 

To seek unto mediums is to forsake God. We 
are to turn from them as from the path to hell. 

The law declares, " There shall not be found 
among you a necromancer." Deut. xviii, 11. The 
people understood this to mean, " one who con- 
sulted disembodied spirits." 

" A man also, or a woman, that hath a famiL'ar 



SPIEITUALISM. 143 

spirit, or that is a wizard, shall surely be put to 
death." Ley. xx, 27. Those who go after them 
to consult them are exposed to the divine dis- 
pleasure : " And the soul that turneth after such 
as have familiar spirits, and after wizards, to go 
a whoring after them, I will even set my face 
against that soul, and will cut him off from 
among his people." Lev. xx, 6. Here the me- 
diums, and those who consult them, are recog- 
nized as guilty of the same crime, and are ex- 
posed to the same punishment. 

The sin of Babylon, and that which caused 
her ruin, was " the multitude of her sorceries, 
and the abundance of her enchantments." Isa. 
xlvii, 9. Her sorcerers, and astrologers, and star- 
gazers, and monthly prognosticators, had no 
power to save her in the day of her visitation. 
" None shall save thee," (Isa. Ixvii, 15,) was the 
final verdict. 

One of the greatest sins of the wicked Ma- 
nasseh, and that for which God cursed him and 
Israel, was, " He used enchantments, and dealt 
with familiar spirits and wizards," (2 Kings 



144 SPIRITUALISM. 

xxi, 65) and thus seduced Israel to do more evil 
than the nations God had destroyed. 

We have one mournful example in the scrip- 
tures for our warning, of a man turning from 
God to spirit-mediums. I refer to Saul. 

The history says, " Saul died for his trans- 
gression which he committed against the Lord, 
even against the word of the Lord, which he 
kept not, and also for asking counsel of one that 
had a familiar spirit, to inquire of it ; and in- 
quired not of the Lord." 1 Chron. x, 13, 14. 

Saul, like some who have gone out from us, 
when he was less corrupt, condemned spirit- 
commerce, and banished such as practiced it 
from his realm. (See 1 Sam. xxviii, 3.) But 
when he is fallen, and forsaken of God, he says, 
" Seek me a woman that hath a familiar spirit, 
that I may go to her, and inquire of her." 
1 Sam. xxviii, Y. Disguised, and under cover 
of night, he goes to the medium and says, " Di- 
vine unto me by the familiar spirit, and bring 
me him up whom I shall name unto thee." 
1 Sam. xxviii, 8. How forcibly is one remind- 



SPIEITUALISM. 145 

ed here of the Spiritualism of these times. The 
medium inquired, "Whom shall I bring up 
unto thee? And he said, Bring me up 
Samuel." 1 Sam. xxviii, 11. Now the spirits 
begin to hover around the spot. The medium 
said, " I saw gods," that is, demons or spirits, 
" ascending out of the earth." " Describe him," 
said Saul. " He is an old man, and is covered 
with a mantle." 1 Sam. xxviii, 12, 14. 

The reason given by Saul for consulting 
Samuel, through the " woman that had a 
familiar spirit at En-dor," was, " I am sore dis- 
tressed, for the Philistines make war against 
me, and God is departed from me, and answer- 
eth me no more, therefore I have called thee 
that thou mayest make known unto me what 
I shall do." 1 Sam. xxviii, 15. Samuel inform- 
ed him that it was useless to consult him if God 
had forsaken him. If God was his enemy, he 
was not his friend. 

Saul was guilty of rebellion against the 

government of God in taking the spoil of the 

Amalekites contrary to the express command ot 

10 



14:6 SPIRITUALISM. 

God. This sin, called rebellion, the magnitude 
of which we can appreciate in these times, is 
said to be '^ as the sin of witchcraft." 1 Sam. 
xv, 23. For this sin " the Lord slew him." 

To reason from analogy, we are forced to the 
conclusion, that modern Spiritualism is to the 
government of God, what southern rebellion is 
to the government of the United States. It is 
a direct blow at its heart to secure its destruc- 
tion. It should be so regarded by every lover 
of truth and righteousness. 

The New Testament, like the Old, is full of 
warning on this subject. 

Paul declares that those who practice witch- 
craft, which all understood to be spirit-com- 
merce, "shall not inherit the kingdom of 
God." Gal. V, 20, 21. "Witchcraft is reckoned 
among the " works of the flesh," and opposed 
to the " fruit of the Spirit." 

" Sorcerers shall have their part in the lake 
which burneth with fire and brimstone ; which 
is the second death." Rev. xxi, 8. 

" I would not that ye should have fellowship 



SPIRITUALISM. 147 

witli devils," says Paul. " Ye cannot drink tlie 
cup of the Lord and the cup of devils ; ye 
cannot be partakers of the Lord's table and 
of the table of devils. Do ye provoke the 
Lord to jealousy? Are we stronger than 
her ICor. X, 20, 21. 

Eev. Mr. Munger has the following appro- 
priate remarks on this passage: "We have 
before proved that the word here translated 
devils, is equivalent to our word ^spirits.' 
Also, that the spirits called up and consulted, 
and worshiped in the heathen feasts, were some- 
times evil angels, but more commonly disem- 
bodied human spirits, such as are consulted in 
our modern circles at their ' tables.' The 
meaning of the apostle, then, seems to be this : 
' I would not that ye should have fellowship 
with the spirits. Te cannot be partakers of the 
Lord's table, and of the tables or circles where 
souls of the dead are evoked and consulted.' 

" In short, he who accepts modem Spiritualism 
renounces Christianity, and God will renounce 
him. In the visions of John, we discover the 



148 SPIRITUALISM. 

sorcerers who made the lie and those who loved 
the lie, shut up in the same hell together." — 
Ancient Sorcery^ etc., p. QQ. 

It is enough for us to know that these 
pretended revelations claim to contradict the 
oracles of God. Even Dr. Hare accuses those 
who disbelieve the mummeries of Spiritualism 
of " straining at the gnat of Spiritualism, yet 
swallowing the camels of Scripture." — P. 24. 
It is in this way that these professed religious 
reformers pour contempt upon that book which 
exposes and denounces their diabolical practices. 

Directly against such bold and blasphemous 
pretensions, the apostle hurls the anathemas of 
Jehovah : " Though we, or an angel from heaven, 
preach any other Gospel unto you than that 
which we have preached unto you, let him be 
accursed." Gal. i, 8. So emphatic is the apostle 
on this subject that he repeats it in another form 
in the next verse, (verse 9 :) " If any man preach 
any other Gospel unto you than that ye have 
received, let him be accursed." Still again, 
'^ If any man think himself to be a prophet, or 



SPIRITUALISM. 14:9 

spiritual, let him acknowledge that the things I 
write unto you are the commandments of the 
Lord;' 1 Oor. xiy, 37. 

"We do not slander Spiritualism when we say 
it professes to preach a Gospel contrary to the 
word which Paul declares to be " the command- 
ments of the Lord." There is no evading the 
conclusion ; either the Bible is false, or the 
wrath of God is denounced against this whole 
system, with all its abettors and agents, and 
nothing but repentance and renunciation of 
their infernal commerce can save them from the 
execution of the fearful denunciation. 

In the days of Jeremiah the spiritualists set 
themselves against God, and urged the people 
not to serve the king of Babylon. Jeremiah 
urged the people not to hearken unto their en- 
chanters and sorcerers who say, " Te shall not 
serve the king of Babylon, for they prophesy a 
lie unto you, to remove you far from your land." 
Jer. xxvii, 9, 10. 

Isaiah warns the people against those who 
turn from the word of God, and seek counsel of 



150 SPIRITUALISM. 

the dead by means of spirit manifestations: 
" When they shall say unto yon. Seek nnto them 
that have familiar spirits, and nnto wizards that 
peep and that mntter : should not a people seek 
unto their God ? for the living to the dead ? To 
the law and to the testimony : if they speak not 
according to this word, it is because there is no 
light in them." Isa. viii, 19, 20. 

Dr. Clarke very properly renders the nine- 
teenth verse, " Should not a nation seek unto 
its God ? Why should you seek unto the dead 
concerning the living ? " 

Dr. Scott remarks, " But when the Jews were 
persuaded to seek unto such persons the prophet 
instructed them to inquire whether a people 
should not seek to their God, and whether it 
were right or reasonable to leave the living to 
consult the dead ; the living God, to consult 
dead idols, or the spirits of dead men, whom 
these witches and wizards pretended to bring 
up to them. A strong expression of indignant 
abhorrence.'' — In loco. 

How could Spiritualism be more clearly de- 



SPIRITUALISM. 151 

scribed ? The operator, a witch, possessed of a 
familiar spirit, seeking through the agency of 
the spirits of dead men knowledge concerning 
the living or the dead; the seeker, a wicked 
dnpe, induced to turn away from "the sure 
word of prophecy " to the uncertain and God- 
forbidden communications of demons. 

Finally, observe among whom the practice of 
consulting the spirits of the dead prevailed. 
We find neither Abraham nor Moses, nor the 
true prophets, nor the apostles, nor any of the 
accepted people of God, seeking after spirits. 
But pagans, who never had revelation ; the 
Canaanites, Egyptians, Chaldeans, Romans, and 
Greeks, apostates from God and his word ; 
Saul, forsaken of God; Manasseh, the wicked 
king, and many others ; these are the persons 
who were found seeking unto spirits. 

In this particular the parallel holds good. 
To an almost incredible extent the spiritualists 
of the present day are composed of infidels, 
apostates from the Christian Church, and the 
most corrupt of mankind. (Rev. C. Munger.) 



152 SPIRITUALISM. 

Spiritualism always appears as an enemy of 
God, and invariably in alliance with his ene- 
mies. Such was the fact in the days of Isaiah 
and Jeremiah, as well as in the days of Christ 
and the apostles. Such has been the fact with 
regard to each development of it to the present 
time. Its chief object seems to be to throw dis- 
credit upon the word of God, and scout the doc- 
trines of the cross. It assaults heaven with the 
boldest blasphemies, stalks on with the most 
unblushing arrogance and presumption, and 
smokes and drips with corruption which would 
shock the morality of a heathen. These are the 
" gnats " of which Dr. Hare speaks, which are 
as nothing compared with the " camels of Scrip- 
ture." So true it is that "wicked men and 
seducers wax worse and worse ; deceiving and 
being deceived." 

Mr. Howitt admits that the law of God was 
against consulting the spirits of the dead ; but 
claims that Christ abrogated that law in seeking 
the spirit of Moses and Elias on the Mount of 
Transfiguration. Speaking of that event, he 



SPIRITUALISM. 153 

Bays, "It is the most remarkable ease in the 
sacred history, because it demonstrates, and no 
doubt was planned by our Saviour to demon- 
strate that express abrogation of the Mosaic law 
regarding the spirits of the dead. Christ abro- 
gated this law by himself seeking the spirit of 
Moses, the very promulgator of that law, and 
leading his disciples to do the same. . . . Christ 
went to seek this spirit, as if the case was studied 
literally, lie might have commanded Moses to 
appear before him in his room ; but no, as the 
law against seeking to the dead was to be abol- 
ished, he went to the spirit of the great dead, 
to Moses, the very man who prohibited such an 
act by the law in question, and there on the 
mount hroke the law before his face, and by his 
example taught his disciples to do the same." — 
Vol. i, p. 218. 

This is a very remarkable interpretation of a 
very plain account of the transfiguration. There 
is net the most distant intimation that Christ 
went up into the mountain to seek the spirits of 
Moses and Elias. The object for which he went 



154: SPIRITUALISM. 

upon the mountain is explicitly stated — to pray, 
and to be transfigured before them. "While en- 
gaged in prayer, the fashion of his countenance 
was altered, so that his face shone as the sun, 
and his raiment was white as the light. In this 
state, it is said, Moses and Elias appea/red unto 
him, and talked with him, not on the subject of 
the abrogation of the laws of Moses forbidding 
men to " seek unto spirits," but '' of his decease 
which he should accomplish at Jerusalem." 
After the departure of Moses and Elias, there 
came a voice from the clouds, sayiag, not that 
the spirits are henceforth to instruct you, but, 
" This is my beloved Son : hear him ! " 

There are serious objections to Mr. Howitt's 
interpretation. 

1. Nothing is said in the account about 
Christ's seeking the spirits of Moses and Elias. 
This was no more an abrogation of the law for- 
bidding spirit commerce than the coming of an- 
gels to minister unto Christ after his temptation 
in the wilderness (Matt, iv, 11) was an abroga- 
tion of the law. 



SPIRITUALISM. 155 

2. Nearly two years after the transfiguration, 
in the account given of the " rich man and Laz- 
arus," Christ clearly vindicates the sufficiency 
of the holy Scriptures as a source of knowledge 
respecting the future world, and settles forever 
the question whether communications from the 
dead are of any practical utility in producing a 
pure life : " They have Moses and the prophets, 
let them hear them. And he said, Nay, but if 
one went to them from the dead, thty will re- 
pent. And he said unto him. If they hear not 
Moses and the prophets, neither will they be 
persuaded, though one rose from the dead." 
How Christ could have abolished the law for- 
bidding " seeking unto spirits," and then repre- 
sent this spirit-commerce as utterly fruitless of 
good, we are unable to see. 

3. This "seeking unto spirits," which Mr. 
Howitt admits is condemned by the law, but 
abrogated by Christ, is the same spirit-com- 
merce which is condemned by the apostles. 
The Old Testament calls it witchcraft^ and pro- 
nounces judgment against it. The apostle calls 



156 SPIRITUALISM. 

it by tlie same name, and condemns it in the 
same manner. The Old Testament calls it sor- 
cery^ and writes condemnation against it. The 
apostle employs the same term, condemning it 
in like manner. They both mean by these 
terms one and the same thing — spirit-commerce. 
If the law against '' seeking unto spirits " had 
been abolished by Christ, does any one suppose 
that the apostles would have pronounced the 
judgments of God upon those who continued in 
the practice ? 

4. Did it ever occur to the reader that the 
appearance of angels and spirits, sanctioned by 
the • Scriptures, is in no way identical with the 
spirit manifestations of modern Spiritualism ; 
while the " seeking unto spirits " by witches, 
etc., condemned by the Old and New Testa- 
ments, is in perfect keeping with modern Spirit- 
ualism ? If God wishes to make important com- 
munications to Abraham he sends three angels, 
who appear unto him as he sits in the door of 
his tent as three men, and they talk with him. 
If God wishes to urge upon Lot the necessity of 



SPIRITUALISM. 157 

his leaving Sodom lie sends two angels, who 
appear to Lot as he sits in the gate of Sodom. 
If Moses and Elias are to be sent they come in 
hiiman form, known even to the disciples. 
Many other cases might be mentioned. But 
the spirits evoked by spiritnalists never appear 
in this manner. They come rapping or tipping, 
or using somebody's organs of speech besides 
their own. 

The spirits whom God sends are never sought. 
"Where in the Bible is a good man found " seek- 
ing unto spirits ? " But witches and sorcerers 
invariably seek unto and call up spirits, who 
make their communications through these 
witches and sorcerers. Saul and the witch of 
En-dor is a case in point. This is the kind ol 
spirit-commerce answering to modern Spiritual- 
ism, which the Bible everywhere condemned. 
Mr. Howitt will not be able to make the candid 
reader believe that Christ has anywhere abro 
gated the law against spirit-commerce. 



158 SPIRITUALISM 



CHAPTER YIII. 

FRUITS OF MODERN SPIRITUALISM. 

Every religions system must be judged by 
its fruits. If it produce, legitimately, social 
disorder, and encourage personal corruption ; if 
it seeks to remove all the barriers to vice, and 
openly sanctions contempt of divine authority, 
it is so far an unmixed evil that it should be dis- 
carded by every lover of God and humanity. 

Mr. William Howitt (History of the Super- 
natural, p. 247) inquires how we are to distin- 
guish " the true from the demoniac Spiritual- 
ism." His reply is, " By the divine rule ; by 
the fruits they produce. That is the heavenly 
criterion which will guide every one who will 
attend to it as unerringly as the needle will guide 
the ship through the tempestuous and nocturnal 
seas, as the traveler through the pathless desert. 
So long as modern Spiritualism produces nev/ 



SPIRITUALISM. 159 

and purer life, a firmer faith, a more fervent 
love of God and man^ we may rest assured of 
its divine paternity ; when it produces evil, it is 
as certainly jfrom the devil." 

We are prepared to accept or reject Spiritual- 
ism on this ground. We do not denounce 
Spiritualism as a corrupt system, because a few 
corrupt persons adhere to it ; for in every re- 
ligious order such persons are found. The sys- 
tem may be good, but these may be its misre]^- 
resentatives. But we are prepared to show that 
moral corruption is the legitimate fruit of Spirit- 
ualism, as a system. If it should produce good 
fruit, it would be " grapes of thorns and figs of 
thistles." Spiritualism has not one redeeming 
quality. We are yet to see the first person 
made better by it either in morals or religion ; 
while the country is swarming with the victims 
of this spirit-commerce, ruined in reputation 
and morals, shunned as a moral pestilence by 
good men, and apparently forsaken of God, as 
those who have turned unto idols. 

The views of the character of Christ and the 



160 SPIRITUALISM. 

teachings of Kevelation, entertained and pro- 
mulgated by Spiritualists, cannot but be ruin- 
ous to the morals of any community embracing 
them. The most bitter and unscrupulous infidels 
of the past never spoke more disrespectfully of 
Christ and the Bible than do these new dispen- 
sation men, who live with one foot in this and 
the other in the spirit-world. 

We propose to lay before our readers a brief 
view of the theology of Spiritualism, that they 
may judge of the correctness of the foregoing 
remarks. 

We will introduce the testimony of Rev. T. 
L. Harris, for a long time a popular spiritualist, 
and hence a competent judge in the matters of 
which he speaks. Mr. Harris seeing the demor- 
alizing tendency of the system abandoned it, 
and exposed its errors in a sermon preached in 
London, January 15th, 1860. He presents a 
clear, comprehensive, and truthful description ot 
the doctrines held by spiritualists, and taught 
professedly by spirits from the unseen world. 
He says. 



SPIRITUALISM. 161 

" First, that nature is God. Second, that 
God is an undeveloped principle in progress of 
evolution. Third, that the Jehovah of the Bible 
was an unprogressed, ferocious human spirit, 
who deceived ancient media. Fourth, that the 
Lord Christ was but a natural man, possessed 
of the ordinary mediumistic faculty of spiritual 
clairvoyance. Fifth, that our Lord's theological 
and psychical teachings were but the reproduc- 
tion of false mythologies. Sixth, that he held 
his power, great or little, because under the 
influence of spirits of departed men. 

" Shall we go further in this catalogue ? We 
open, then, another series of spiritual teachings. 
"First, that all things originate in nature. 
Second, that man is a development of the ani- 
mal. Third, that the first parents of the human 
race, bom of brutes, were themselves but sava- 
ges of the most degraded type. Fourth, that 
all things and beings are governed by natural 
necessity ; that man possesses no freedom in the 
moral will. Fifth, that there is no retrogres- 
sion, through moral disorders, either of the indi« 

11 



162 SPIKITUALISM. 

vidual or of the species. Sixth, that vice is 
virtue in its improgressed or germinal condi- 
tion ; that sin is an impossible chimera. Seventh, 
that self-love is the very center and fountain- 
head of all human affections, the chief inspirer 
of all human or spiritual actions. Eighth, that 
the spiritual world is but a theater for the con- 
tinued evolution of human spirits, under the per- 
petual force of nature working through self-love. 

" Or again, turn to another series : First, that 
the Scriptures are not the word of God, and that 
the divine Spirit never vouchsafed utterance to 
man. Second, that the Messiah, our Redeemer, 
is not in any sense a Saviour of the soul from 
sin, death, and hell. Third, that he never met 
in combat our spiritual foe ; that he never over- 
came or cast out destroying spirits from their 
human slaves ; that he never made an atone- 
ment or expiation for sin ; that he never rose 
in his reassumed humanity from the grave ; that 
he never ascended, glorified, to heaven ; that 
he never communicated the Holy Ghost. 

" Or again, to another : That there is no judg- 



SPIRITUALISM. 163 

ment to come beyond the grave, wherein the 
Lord shall adjudge the departed according to 
their deeds, the good to eternal life, the evil to 
everlasting punishment and the second death. 
That all men, irrespective of formed character for 
evil here, become the delighted and immortal 
inhabitants of a perpetual elysium. That broad 
is the way and wide is the gate that leadeth unto 
life eternal, and that none can help to find it. 

" Or again : and now as touching a moral 
point of social interest. Spirits declare that 
there is no marriage as a natural law, but that 
polygamy or bigamy are as orderly as the mo- 
nogamic tie. But if this be not frequently in- 
culcated, what shall we say to the broadly put 
forth declaration of spirits, that the marital tie 
is the result of natural affinity, and that where 
two are legally conjoined, and the wandering 
inclinations of either rove to another object, the 
new attraction becomes the lawful husband or 
wife ? " — Harrises Sermon^ pp. 5-7. 

Mr. Harris concludes in the following lan- 
guage : 



164 SPIKITUALISM. 

" I pledge myself, and stand committed to the 
assertion, that through medinmistic channels, 
all these things are taught as emanating from 
the spirits ; and worse is taught, if possible, to 
those who penetrate the inner circles of the 
gloomy mysteries, where the old magic is born 
again." 

An association of individuals holding and ad- 
vocating such views cannot but be a curse to 
any community in which they may exist. Such 
principles are absolutely demoralizing. 

We will permit spiritualists to speak for 
themselves, then we shall not be accused of 
misrepresenting their views. 

SPIEITUALISTIC VIEW OF SIIST. 

Dr. Hare, an oracle among the Spiritualists, 
says, " The prodigious diversity between virtue 
and vice is the consequence of contingencies, 
which are no more under the control of the in- 
dividual affected, than the color of his hair or 
the number of cubits in his stature." 

Again, " There is no evil that can be avoid- 



SPIRITUALISM. 165 

ed." The meaning of all this is, a man may 
steal yonr purse, rob your house, murder your 
wife, or ruin your daughter ; he may be found 
a drunkard in a rum-shop, a bacchanalian in a 
brothel, a convict in a prison, or a bloody crim- 
inal on a gallows, and his crimes are no more 
his own acts than the color of his hair, or the 
height of his growth. 

These views of Dr. Hare are in perfect keep- 
ing with revelations made professedly by spirits. 
He says, " Such an inference coincides with 
the communications recently received from the 
spirits of departed friends." In view of such 
necessity to wrong action. Dr. Hare claims that 
Christ has imposed upon us " excessive and im- 
practicable restraints." 

I do not wonder that such a moral teacher 
should declare, " The Bible of the spiritualists 
is the book of nature, the only one which by 
inward and outward evidence can be ascribed 
to divine authorship." 

Miss Lizzie Doten, a popular spiritualist, 
Bays, " Whatever man does, he but works out 



166 SPIRITUALISM. 

through the mediumship of Deity." — Bannef 
of Light, February 8, 1862. 

In view of such a faith the following prayer 
is appropriate, (Banner of Light, December 3, 
1862,) " We thank thee for all conditions of men, 
for the drunkard, for the prostitute, for the dis- 
solute of every description." 

Spiritualists claim that wickedness and mo- 
rality alike help on their cause, and hence they 
have no word of condemnation for the former, 
or approval for the latter. A writer in the 
" Banner of Light," January 18, 1862, says, 

" I have no reply for those who tell me such 
a one does wickedly, or such a one holds 
erroneous sentiments ; that one is in free love, 
another in atheism; for there is not an act 
done, not a sentiment entertained, not a freak 
of free love, nor a frozen blast of atheism . . . 
that does not help on the grand and glorious 
superstructure." 

A writer in the same paper, February 8, 1862^ 
says, 

" In all, too, that I have written upon the all- 



SPIRITUALISM. 167 

right subject, I hope there is not to be found 
anything that deals condemnation and blame to 
any of the deeds done by humanity. Humanity 
acts by the force of its own inherent, invisible 
power, the same as the earth revolves by its 
own inherent, invisible power of revolution- 
or as the vegetable world sends forth its tints 
of beauty in a thousand kinds and forms, all 
* from the inherent nature of the germs that 
make these kinds and forms." 

The writer continues : "I cannot think that 
libertinism injures the immortal soul of man.'' 

One would suppose that these were the senti- 
ments of abandoned libertines, who were seek- 
ing under cover of religion to practice deeds 
of darkness. But spirits professedly teach the 
same. '' We declare," says a spirit, (Banner 
of Light, March 8, 1862,) 'Hhere never was 
an individual spirit that trespassed upon the 
smallest portion of God's law." 

In the ^^ Banner of Light," October 29, 1859, 
we have the report of a discussion by a Con- 
vention of Spiritualists : 



168 SPIRITUALISM. 

" Question, Are the manifestations of human 
life that we call evil, or sinful, a necessity of 
the conditions of the soul's progress ? 

" Dr. Child. From the deepest and most sin- 
cere convictions of my soul, I answer to the 
question: That what we call sin and evil in 
human actions is a necessity^ and, being a neces- 
sity, it is lawful and right. This view of the 
question is in harmony with all evil; it sees 
all that is wrong and repulsive to the soul's 
higher longings, as being the effects of a means 
in the ordering of Divine Wisdom, for the 
production of the greatest possible good for 
humanity. It sees darkness as necessary as 
light in the spiritual as well as in the physical 
world. ... It recognizes the hand of God in 
the serpent's venom as much as in the fragrance 
of the pure water-lily ; in the crude granite, as 
full and perfect as in the existence of angel- 
life. It sees all the manifestations of life, both 
good and bad, as being the immediate effect 
of nature's laws, which laws are the laws of 
God — ^laws that were never broken, and never 



SPIRITUALISM. 169 

can be ; laws, every jot and tittle of wliicli, as 
Christ has said, must be fulfilled. ... It sees 
the manifestation of every human soul, whether 
good or bad, as being the necessary result of 
a certain condition, in which condition is to 
be found a natural cause that produced the 
good or bad action. Judas, the traitor, was 
as faithful to the condition of his being as was 
St. John, the divine — each performed the mis- 
sion assigned to each, lawfully and truly. Be- 
hind the holy deeds of Fenelon there existed 
natural causes that produced them; he could 
not help the manifestations of good. Behind 
the dark deeds of King Herod, the enemy of 
Christ, there existed natural causes that pro- 
duced the wicked deeds of his life; he could 
not help them. In Fenelon there is no merit ; 
in Herod there is no demerit. There are no 
laudations for Fenelon, and no condemnation 
for Herod. There is no comparison to be made 
between the two; no judgment to be insti- 
tuted. Fenelon is a child of God: Herod is 
the same — each heirs of eternal life and the 



170 SPIRITUALISM. 

blessings of God that await. them in the com- 
ing future. Fenelon is no nearer to God than 
Herod is. . . . The affirmative accepts every 
opinion and every creed, and not only opinions 
and creeds, but every deed of goodness and 
every deed of evil, as being necessary and 
right, that ever existed in the great family of 
humanity. 

''Mr. Newton said: I shall not deny that 
evils and sins of the descriptions mentioned 
are for the most part necessary^ in the constitu- 
tion of things, to growth or progress. Plainly 
there can be no pkogress unless there is a 
lower as well as a higher. There is no attain- 
ing to perfection, unless there is an imperfec- 
tion to begin with. All such evils are merely 
lesser goods. Nor, again, do I deny, that the 
road through hell — even the lowest hell' — may 
lead eventually to heaven ; nor that those who 
travel that way and reach the celestial city at 
last, through crimes and miseries and agonies 
untold, will not have a larger capacity for 
happiness and for usefulness in saving others 



SPIKITUALISM. 171 

than tlie merely innocent, the passively good, 
whose robes were never stained even by con- 
tact with the vile. None of these positions 
shall I deny, for I honestly believe them 
true. 

" H. F. Gardner. Dr. Child has got more 
philosophy in his ideas of good and evil than 
most people ever thought of. The world ought 
to know and feel the necessity, the blessing of 
sin. Jesus and Judas both had the experience 
they needed, and neither were made better or 
worse by the simple acts they were compelled 
to do by their innate condition. 

" Mr, Wilson^ of New York : I am with my 
friend. Dr. Child, for his views come nearest 
to the standard of true Christianity of any 
I ever heard ; they are but a reiteration of the 
philosophy taught eighteen hundred years ago. 
Moral distinctions I cannot recognize as an 
essential quality of the soul. 

"Miss Lizzie Doten^ {entranced.) Evil is evil 
only by comparison. . . . "Why does he (point- 
ing to Dr. Child) present such views? It is 



172 SPIEITUALISM. 

because the philanthropy of his large heart 
wants to take all humanity to heaven, the 
wicked and the suffering, as well as the good 
and the happy. He would take even the devil 
himself to heaven, and it may be that the 
devil will have a seat in heaven; that God 
will say, ' Take, Lucifer, thy place. This day 
art thou redeemed to archangelic state.' 

"The views of Dr. Child are broad and 
comprehensive; he goes for generals. His 
views are right, his position is true. In this 
general view the wisdom of Providence is 
seen in its perfection ; there is no evil^ no sin / 
but when you come to minutisB, with limited 
perception, you see evil. God produced every- 
thing good at first, and God has never changed 
his mind ; everything is good still." 

Here we find Fenelon and Herod, Judas 
and Christ, equal unto the angels ; sin a bless- 
ing, moral distinctions annihilated, and Lucifer 
on his way to heaven. 

These are samples of the spiritualistic view 
of sin. Yiews, it seems to us, more in conflict 



SPIBITUALISM. 173 

with common sense, more revolting to morality, 
more at war with the potent barriers to vice, 
and more directly calculated to overtmn all 
well-regulated society, never fell from the lips 
of infidel or demon. If these be the doctrines 
of spirits, as claimed by spiritualists, they must 
be what Saint Paul calls " doctrines of devils," 
from which all should turn away. 

SPIRITUALISTIC VIEW OF CHRIST. 

The manner in which spiritualists speak of the 
Saviour amounts to little less than blasphemy. 

The "Banner of Light, December 8, 1861, 
says, "Once mankind clung to the cross, and 
adored the form of Him who was crucified on 
Calvary, as a God. But reason has asserted its 
supremacy, and the world has declared it would 
not have this man to reign over it any longer." 

One is strikingly reminded of the language of 
the Saviour in speaking of himself : Luke xix. 
" A certain nobleman went into a far country, to 
receive for himself a kingdom, and to return. 
And he called his ten servants, and delivered 



174 SPIRITUALISM. 

them ten pounds, and said unto them. Occupy 
till I come. But his citizens hated him, saying, 
We will not have this man to reign over us." 
"When he returned, of these last he said, " But 
those mine enemies, which would not that I 
should reign over them, bring hither, and slay 
them before me." 

Julian the Apostate reproached Christ while 
living, but when dying he exclaimed, " O Gali- 
, ean, thou hast conquered." 

The same mouth-piece of Spiritualism con- 
tinues : " Thus Jesus has become only a man, 
stripped of all false pretensions, and we have 
even aspired to stand by his side on the Mount 
of Calvary." The Jews once stood by his side 
on the Mount of Calvary, but it was only to 
give utterance to the malice of the human heart 
in " Crucify him, crucify him ! " 

Emma Harding, a popular medium of Spirit- 
ualism, inquires, " What evidence have we that 
Christ is the Lord of Spirits? has any sort of 
influence upon our hereafter, or even has an ob- 
jective existence at all ? . . . Science, sense, and 



SPIRITUALISM. 175 

reason prove to me, that my dead father lives. 
. . . Why should I doubt him when he tells me 
he sees no Jesus in his hereafter, knows none ? 
. . . When the testimony of thousands of spirits 
is confirmatory of my father's experience, and I 
never yet met with one of the redeemed by the 
merits of Jesus, and never yet saw a fact in 
Spiritualism which proved any such redemp- 
tion, nor met with any medium who could prove 
any such spirit, I still maintain my position." — 
Banner of Light^ December 28, 1861. 

A spirit, calling herself Martha Hutchins, 
makes the following statement, (Banner of 
Light, March 1, 1852:) "My father was aChris^ 
tian, but I was not. There are no Christians 
here ; they don't believe in anything like they 
used to when they came here." 

It may be easily shown why the spirits who 
communicate with spiritualistic mediums have 
n ever seen Christ, or known him as a Redeemer, in 
the world from which they come, as neither he 
nor the redeemed reside in that world. "With- 
out are sorcerers and idolaters, and whosoever 



176 SPIRITUALISM. 

lovetli and maketli a lie." " Where I am," says 
Jesus, "there shall my servants be." But to 
the wicked, " Whither I go, ye cannot come." 
This is the evidence that these communications, 
if from spirits, are from demons damned. They 
find neither Jesus the Redeemer, nor Christians 
the redeemed, in the world to which their sins 
have consigned them. 

Stephen and John had a very different view 
of Jesus and the redeemed. While dying, Ste- 
phen looked upward and saw heaven opened, 
and Jesus sitting at the right hand of God, and 
he prayed, " Lord Jesus receive my spirit," and 
passed away. 

John had a view of Jesus and the souls he had 
redeemed in the heaven which opened upon his 
vision. Their songs were full of Jesus and re- 
demption: "Worthy is the Lamb to receive 
riches, and honor, and power ; for thou wast 
slain, and hast redeemed us to God by thy 
blood, out of every kindred, people, and nation." 

Stephen and John claim to have seen heaven. 
They claim to have seen Jesus in that world. 



SPIRITUALISM, 177 

Spiritualists say, " There is not a fact in Spirit- 
ualism going to show the existence of any such 
person" in the world from which their com- 
munications come. 

St. John claims to have seen a great multi- 
tude who had been redeemed by the blood of 
Jesus. Spiritualists say they never met with a 
redeemed spirit, and there is not a fact in Spirit- 
ualism going to prove the existence of any such 
spirit. The simple inference from all this is, 
that Stephen and John had a view of one world 
and spiritualists of another ; one of heaven, the 
other of hell ; one of spirits redeemed, the other 
of spirits damned ; showing most conclusively 
that spiritualists have departed " from the faith, 
giving heed to seducing spirits and doctrines of 
devils." 

SPIRITUALISTIC VIEW OF HELL. 

Spiritualists descant upon the doctrine of 

fixture punishment and the existence of hell 

with feelings amounting to holy horror. A 

distinguished spiritualist says, " I need not re- 

12 



178 SPIRITUALISM. 

mind the thinker what sort of a father grows 
out of the idea of hell." And yet, strange to 
say, they propose to go through hell to reach 
heaven : making it a half-way house in their 
journey. 

Miss Doten says, "Heaven, hell, and earth 
are but three indissoluble degrees contiguous to 
each other. We must go through hell to reach 
heaven. We cannot leave earth without going 
to hell first, for that is the ante-chamber to 
heaven." — Banner ofLight^ Dec, 1861. 

The rich man of the Scriptures left earth in 
the same direction which spiritualists propose to 
take. He met in his way an impassable gulf. 
Seeing his folly, he proposed to send back a 
messenger, and warn his friends not to come 
that way. But he was informed that if his 
friends would not heed the warnings of the 
sacred Word they would not be persuaded to 
change their course by what a spirit from the 
dead might say to them. As spiritualists pro- 
pose to take the same road which their ancient 
friend took, even now that the spirits have re- 



SPIRITUALISM. 179 

turned, the evidence is conclnsive that Abra- 
ham was correct in his judgment of the matter. 

In view of such sentiments, it is not difficult 
to explain the friendly relations which exist, 
professedly, between spiritualists and the devil. 
It is prudent to secure the friendship of those 
through whose country we propose to journey. 

It may appear strange, but it is nevertheless 
true, that spiritualists offer prayer to the devil. 
As an evidence of this, read the following from 
the " Banner of Light," March 1, 1862 : 

« rSTYOCATIOK. 

"O thou prince of darkness and king of 
light, god and devil, greater and lesser good, 
perfect and imperfect being! we ask and de- 
mand of thee that we may know thee, for to 
know thee is to know more of ourselves. And 
if to do this it be necessary to wander in hell, 
yea and amen, we will wander there with the 
spirits of darkness. The Church and the world 
tell us that the devil goeth about like a roaring 
lion, seeking whom he may devour, but wq 



180 SPIRITUALISM. 

know thee only as God's vicegerent, to stand at 
his left hand, the regenerator of mankind, the 
means of bringing up all things, intellectually 
and morally, to perfection." 

Lizzie Doten offered the following prayer at 
Lyceum Hall, Boston, Dec. 8, 1861. Eeported 
for the "Banner of Light," and published in 
that paper, Dec. 21, 1861 : 

INVOCATION. 

" Lucifer, thou sun of the morning, who 
fell from thy high estate, and whom mortals are 
prone to call the embodiment of evil, we lift our 
voices unto thee. We know that thou canst 
not harm us unless by the will of the Almighty, 
of whom thou art a part and portion, and in 
whose economy thou playest thy part ; and we 
cannot presume to sit in judgment over Deity. 
From the depths of thine infamy streams forth 
divine truth. "Why should we turn from thee ? 
Does not the same inspiration rule us all ? Is 
one in God's sight better than another? We 



SPIKITUALISM. 181 

know thou art yet to come up in his expanded 
creation, purified by the influence of God's love, 
for his love is not perfected while one of his 
children writhes in misery. So, O Lucifer, do 
we come up and stand before the throne of the 
Ancient of Days, hand in hand with thee. As 
thou hast been the star of the morning, thou 
wilt again become an angel of light. O, Sa- 
tan, we will subdue thee with our love, and 
thou wilt yet kneel humbly with us at the 
throne of God." 

A person unacquainted with the theory and 
practice of spiritualists might regard this as a 
burlesque upon Spiritualism ; but we must re- 
member that this is a sober address to Satan, in 
the presence of a Boston audience, in the year 
1861, by one of the most popular mediums in 
"New England. 

Spiritualism can lay claim to nothing new, 
however, in its special friendship for and wor- 
ship of the devil. Pagans have the start of 
them. Devil-worship has been systematized in 



182 SPIRITUALISM. 

Ceylon, Burmah, and many parts of tlie East 
Indies ; and an order of devil-priests lias existed 
even in modern times. Mr. Ives, in his travels 
througli Persia, gives an account of tlie devil- 
worship among the San jacks, a nation inhab 
iting the country about Mosul, the ancient 
Nineveh. This strange people once professed 
Christianity, then Mohammedanism, and finally 
Devilism. There is a remarkable identity, in 
faith and practice, between these strange people 
and spiritualists. Mr. Ives says, " They say it 
is true that the devil has at present a quarrel 
with God ; but the time will come when, the 
pride of his heart being subdued, he will make 
his submission to the Almighty; and as the 
Deity cannot be implacable, the devil will re- 
ceive a fuU pardon for all his transgressions, 
and both he and all those who paid him atten- 
tion during his disgrace will be admitted into 
the blessed mansions. This is the foundation of 
their hope, and this chance for heaven they es- 
teem to be a better one than that of trusting in 
their own merits, or the merits of the leader of 



SPIRITUALISM. 183 

any religion whatsoever. The person of the 
devil thej look on as sacred. "Whenever they 
speak of him, it is with the utmost respect." 

Who can question for a moment but that 
Spiritualism is from beneath, and that all who 
adhere to it are guilty of devil-worship ? Are 
not these the unclean spirits which came out of 
the mouth of the dragon and false prophets? 
(Eev. xvi, 13, 14.) They were " the spirits of 
devils working miracles." 



SPIRITUALISTIC VIEW OF THE MARRIAGE 
RELATION. 

Spiritualists seek professedly to pull down 
and destroy all existing institutions. It seeks 
to lay its fiendish hand upon all the safeguards 
of social life, and remove every barrier to the 
gratification of their prejudices or passions. 
Governments are to become a Babel of ruins ; 
Church and State are to become true yoke-fel- 
lows ; religious organizations are to crumble at 
lU tough; la^^d § beautiful struqture^ "full of 



184 SPIBITUALISM. 

corruption and dead men's bones," is to take 
their place. 

With regard to the marriage relation, so far 
as they think it prudent to divulge their real 
views, they are outspoken. Their view of this 
relation may be inferred from a sentiment put 
forth at a wedding in Charlestown, Mass., Nov. 
20, 1861 : "Legal marriage, practically, is selfish, 
carnal, worldly-minded, and belongs to mam- 
mon." 

Referring to the marital relation, under the 
head of "social questions," a writer in the 
" Banner of Light " says, " If spiritualists ever 
accomplish the work assigned them, they must 
no longer ask to wink out of sight those great 
social questions underlying the foundations of 
true life. If our social or affectional relations 
are wrong we must seek to right them, and 
render them pure, true, and harmonic, or all 
our efforts in other directions will prove abor- 
tive. It is worse than nonsense for us to falter 
for the sake of reputation, popularity, or false 
public opinion, [Reputation, it seems, is of no 



SPIEITUALISM. 185 

account witli spiritualists.] These are shams. 
. . . Millions of hearts are now breaking, burst- 
ing, or rising in rebellion. All false unions are 
being fearfully shaken and sundered. No won- 
der at the alarm of timid, selfish, conservative, 
sordid souls. Many dangers are threatened, 
but these are inevitable to all great revolutions. 
. . . But hells must have an airing, and the 
sunlight of the spheres be let in. Many sad, 
unfortunate, social disruptions may ensue, but 
all these things are essential, as experiences to 
impart lessons of wisdom and prudence. 

" Spiritualism will become the living gospel 
of the age only so far as its believers begin to 
practice its principles, regardless of policy or 
reputation, ... let the cost, the sacrifice, be 
what it may. Come, brothers and sisters, who 
dare begin ? " 

I understand this writer to mean that all 
marital relations which are not perfectly har- 
monious should at once be dissolved. No mat- 
ter how much ruin may result to wife and chil- 
dren, and whole households; no matter how 



186 SPIRITUALISM 

much sadness and misfortune may result from 
such social disruptions; these are essential to 
the accomplishment of the end sought by Spirit- 
ualism. Instead of hell's having an airing by 
the advancement of such views, hell holds jubi- 
lee at the removal of all the safeguards to do- 
mestic happiness. 

John M. Spear, at a lecture in Utica, N". T., 
delivered himself of the following anathema : 

"Cursed be the marriage institution; cursed 
be the relation of husband and wife; cursed 
be all who would sustain legal marriage! 
What if there are a few tears shed, or a few 
hearts broken? They only go to build up a 
great principle, and all great truths have their 
martyrs." 

A correspondent of the "Spiritual Tele- 
graph," in referring to an unmarried woman 
who had recently become a mother, commends 
her for the course, regarding it as a signal 
triumph of a spiritualistic principle. He says : 

"It is reserved for this our day, under the 
inspiration of the spirit-world, for a quiet, 



SPIEITUALISM. 187 

equable, retiring woman to rise up in the 
dignity of her womanhood, and declare in the 
face of her oppressors and a scowling world, 
I will be free ! God helping me, though T 
stand alone, penniless, friendless, homeless, for- 
saken of all. I will exercise that. dearest of 
all rights, the holiest and most sacred of all 
heaven's gifts— the right of maternity — in the 
way which to me seemeth right ; and no man, 
nor set of men ; no Church, no State, shall 
withhold from me the realization of that purest 
of all aspirations inherent in every true woman, 
the right to re-beget myself when, and by 
whom, and under such circumstances, as to me 
seem fit and best." 

We might multiply quotations from spiritual- 
ists on this subject, but there can be no doubt 
but Spiritualism seeks to remove all the old 
landmarks which have been set up for the de- 
fense of morality, religion, and good order 
among men. It seeks to let loose a horde of 
lecherous, religious mountebanks upon the com- 
munity, such as "creep into houses and lead 



188 SPIRITUALISM. 

captive silly women, laden with sins, led away 
with divers lusts ;" " men of corrupt minds, 
reprobate concerning the truth." 2 Tim. iii, 6, 8. 

Already hundreds of homes, once happy, have 
been turned into earthly hells, filled with untold 
horrors ; fathers and husbands wandering in the 
mazes of Spiritualism in search of some Jeze- 
bel who "calleth herself a prophetess," while 
wife and children are left to poverty, shame, 
and disgrace. Spiritualism glories in this work, 
claims to be called of God to it, aud is resorting 
to every means that can be invented by the most 
subtle ingenuity of depraved minds to accom- 
plish its object. 

Their practice is fully up to their theory. A 
writer having been for some time identified with 
Spiritualism, but renouncing it, made the fol- 
lowing statement some three years ago : " We 
have more than four hundred public mediums 
and spiritual lecturers in the northern states. 
At least three hundred of them have been mar- 
ried. Nearly one half of these have absolved 
their conjugal relations; a large proportion of 



SPIRITUALISM. 189 

the remainder are living in the most discordant 
relations, having abandoned the bed of their 
partners, and by mntnal consent of many, liv- 
ing in promiscuous concubinage." 

We could register the names of many who, 
before they became spiritualists, were happy in 
the enjoyment of domestic life ; but now their 
families are broken up, and desolation reigns 
where happiness once smiled. I charge spirit- 
ualists with being guilty of the outrage. It is 
what they advocate, and what their doctrine of 
spiritual affinities implies. It is an outrage on 
society, and every man who sustains it says, in 
so doing, that whenever his inclinations or lusts 
lead him from the wife he has sworn to love, to 
unite himself to a paramour, he is authorized 
by his creed, yea, by the teaching of the spirits, 
to do so. 

It may be objected by some that we have 
only spoken of evil spirits. This is true. But 
we have spoken of all the spirits which Spirit- 
ualism has evoked, good and bad. "A good 
tree cannot bring forth evil fruit. Wherefore, 



190 SPIRITUALISM. 

by their fruit ye shall know them." A system 
^vhich produces such fruits as we have described 
and shall ftirther describe is an unmixed evil, 
and cannot have the support of God or good 
angels. The devil can change himself into an 
angel of light, and by " signs, and lying won- 
ders, and deceivableness of unrighteousness," 
quite stagger the faith of the elect. 

We have witnessed its phenomena, seen tables 
tip, seen writing executed in a mysterious man- 
ner, heard trance speakers, etc., and from the 
first observations made, we have been convinced 
of its Satanic character. 



SPIRITUALISM. 191 



CHAPTEE IX. 

TESTIMOKY AGAINST SPIRITUALISM, 

The following testimonies against Spiritual- 
ism are from persons who have been identified 
witli the system, and among its prominent sup- 
porters. They have witnessed its workings be- 
hind the curtain^ and seen its influence upon its 
mediums and chief advocates. They have been 
driven, by witnessing its terrible fruits, to aban- 
don the system, and to warn others of the 
danger of spirit-commerce. 

The first is from Mr. William Fishbough, sev- 
eral years editor of the " Spiritual Telegraph," 
scribe of Andrew Jackson Davis's " Nature's 
Divine Revelation," and popularly known as a 
prominent spiritualist of the highest order. The 
authors of " Mysterious Noises " say he is " one 
of the most philosophical observers of the vari- 
ous phenomena of the human mind, and a well- 



192 SPIRITUALISM. 

known psychological writer," and " editor of the 
TJnivercoelum," etc. His testimony as to the 
influence of Spiritualism may be found in the 
following paragraph, written June 25th5 1860 : 

" While I firmly believe that God has over- 
ruled it from the first for the accomplishment of 
wise and beneficent purposes, and that its phe- 
nomena, when religiously studied in the light of 
the divine word, will settle some very important 
points of psychological and pneumatic science, 
I am compelled to say that its great leading 
doctrines and philosophizing, when viewed in the 
abstract, are an attack, either open or covert, 
upon all that is vital in religion, and upon all 
the more potent barriers to vice and social dis- 
order that are provided by the law ; and that if 
its tendencies could remain unchecked, the re- 
sult would be a dissolution of all the chief bonds 
of society. I am, moreover, constrained to warn 
all men, on peril of the most fatal consequences, 
against seeking the aid of ' Beelzebub, the god 
of Ekron,' or of any other demon, so long as 
there is a ' God in Israel.' 2 Kings i, 2-6." 



SPIRITUALISM. 193 

THE TESTIMONY OF WM. B. COAN. 

Mr. Coan is, or was, the husband of A. L. 
Coan, the celebrated rapping and test medium. 
Mrs. Coan is said to have left her husband, and 
to have taken up a life of promiscuous prostitu- 
tion, for which he obtained a divorce. He for- 
merly traveled from Maine to Minnesota, in 
company with his wife, giving " tests of spiritual 
identity," and was engaged in the business for 
about six years. He says, in a letter to a 
friend : 

" Dear Sir, — In reply to your request for 
my opinion of modem Spiritualism, I will saj^, 
I consider it a great and dangerous delusion ; 
the greatest curse that ever visited this or any 
other people ; a destroyer of religion, domestic 
peace, and the moral sense of its victims, and 
leading finally to licentiousness and prostitu- 
tion. It has already broken up more families 
in this country than all other causes combined. 
It leads its victims on step by step until they 

commit enormities, under the belief that they 

13 



194 SPIRITUALISM. 

are doing God's service, the very thought of 
which would have been revolting to them before 
they were caught in its intoxicating snare. 
" Fraternally yours, Wm. B. CoAisr. 

^'New York, June 27, 1861." 

THE TESTIMONY OF B. F. HATCH, M.D. 

Dr. Hatch is the husband of Cora L. V. Hatch, 
the popular trance-medium. He was for a long 
time a prominent spiritualist, and is well quali- 
fied to testify with regard to its doctrines and 
moral influence. He has been shamefully 
abused by spiritualists since he has attempted 
to expose their wickedness ; but the facts stated 
are known and read of all men who have any 
knowledge of Spiritualism. 

Having had several private conversations 
with Dr. Hatch on the subject of Spiritualism, 
I requested him to give me, in writing, a brief 
statement of his views on the subject. The fol- 
lowing letter was received in reply. It must 
be confessed that the picture is a dark one, but 
it is no darker than the facts will justify. 



SPIRITUALISM. 195 

" Eey. W. M'Donald : 

" Dear Sir, — Tou ask for a brief statement 
of my observation and experience of modern 
Spiritualism, which for the benefit of the public 
I am most happy to give. In its early history, 
having for several years been a public advocate 
of the doctrine of universal salvation, I was pre- 
pared to accept the claims of Spiritualism as 
being angelic, and it is well known that for 
several years I did much to establish it on this 
basis. For a while its real character and nature 
were hid amid extravagant pretensions of the 
blessings to result from ' these hen^venly messen- 
gers visiting earth's inhabitants ;' and in its early 
development we saw but little, comparatively, 
of the mischievous effects that are now every- 
where so conspicuous. 

" Suffice it to say that the horde of damned 
spirits which still linger amid the scenes of their 
former wickedaiess, Proteus-like, assuming any 
and every form to accomplish their hellish pur- 
pose, soon demonstrated, not only the falsity of 
my previous faith, but also the terrible danger 



196 SPIKITUALISM. 

of carrying on a forbidden commerce witli the 
unseen world. As it commanded attention 
throngh. the powerful demonstrations of the 
physical phenomena, and public confidence by 
false pretensions, it became more and more un- 
masked as to its real tendency, until now the 
drama of the basest iniquity is freely and, in 
many instances, openly enacted before the be- 
wildered gaze of the public. To-day its mis- 
chievous and corrupting effects are limited only 
by the capability of human depravity. . There 
is now a class of necromancers or earthly 
devils, denominated mediums, (and they are 
the most favorably known in the spiritual- 
istic ranks,) whose secret crimes excel in real 
wickedness those of Messalina and the Borgias. 
This statement, extravagant as it may ap- 
pear, I stand pledged as a man of honor to 
fully demonstrate whenever called upon to 
do so. 

" I will rehearse some of the leading doctrines 
of Spiritualism, as I gather them in private 
conversation, and from their oral speeches and 



SPIRITUALISM. 197 

publications. In holy reverence commit your 
soul to God wliile yon read. 

" God is irreverently called the ' old man who 
seduced Mary and begat Christ the bastard.' 
Christ, a very well-meaning but ignorant Jew- 
ish gentleman, who manifested his goodness of 
heart in forgiving the adulteress woman, but 
exposed his ignorance of human needs when he 
requested her to sin no more. The apostles 
were very good mediums, but too much biased 
by the ignorance and superstitions of their co- 
temporaries. The Bible, which means 'excel- 
lent soft bark,' will do for an imbecile and 
unenlightened people, but is superseded by the 
spiritual philosophy. Self-love is the throne of 
God within, and should be obeyed. 

^^ Marriage is universal, and knows no limit but 
desire, has no moral binding force, and should 
be adhered to only by such as are willing to be 
slaves, as the law of afiinity transcends all in- 
stitutions. The right to choose a different 
father for each and every successive offspring 
^is inherent in every true woman,' and the 



198 SPIRITUALISM. 

intimate relation of husband and wife should 
precede marriage as a preliminary means of 
judging of their fitness to each other. All lust- 
ful desires should be ultimated, as this becomes 
the means of their purification. Cursings are 
but the dross of human nature^ and are bless- 
ings to him who uses them. Blaspheming God 
is a purifying process of the soul. ' Every 
curse (Banner of Light, April 28, 1860) escap- 
ing the lips of the profane one is a blessing to 
him; it is casting off evil in the spirit-sparks 
from the fire, which will purify the spirit.' 

" Murder but hurries the victim to heaven and 
blesses the murderer. Yice in every form is 
equally meritorious with virtue, as there is no 
moral responsibility. Sin is an impossible chim- 
era. Chastity is a name with no other mean- 
ing than bondage to barbarous institutions. 
And life with all its varied scenes is but a 
prelude of that drama to be played beyond the 
valley of the shadow of death. 

" Need I say that their practices are fully in 
keeping with this creed ? This is painfully de- 



SPIRITUALISM. 199 

monstrated wherever they have gained any foot- 
hold. Some of the most prominent spiritual- 
ists have confessed that the strongest bond of 
union among them is the facility their associa- 
tion affords for sexual debauchery. 

"Every woman, so far as I know, (and I 
know of many,) who yields herself to spirit-in- 
fluence leads a meretricious life ; and I serious- 
ly question there being any exception to this 
rule, for the latter is the legitimate result of the 
former. 

" In our municipal courts we have no protec- 
tion against this pernicious people, 

" On more occasions than one I have known 
one after another, under the sanctity of an oath, 
deliberately fabricate the basest falsehood with- 
out any perceptible compunctions of conscience. 
I most solemnly affirm that during several years' 
acquaintance with the leading spiritualists of 
this country, I have never been able to discover 
among them any other standard of morality than 
a fidelity to their wickedness. Notwithstand- 
ing that most of their public advocates are men 



•^. 



200 SPIRITUALISM. 

and women stripped of every virtue, and many 
of them openly living in adulterous relations, 
and murdering the embryo offsprings of their 
own guilt, not one of them, to my knowledge, 
has ever received a rebuke from their journals 
or confederates in principles. 

" But those who have left them, and rebuked 
their abominations, because they could not brook 
them, have been made to feel their invectives 
and slander as if vomited forth from all pande- 
monium. In no single instance have I known 
of any improvement (neither do I expect it) in 
the moral or religious life of its votaries, but 
uniformly its tendency has been to bewilder the 
judgment and corrupt the life, until all moral dis- 
tinctions are ignored. And what is still worse 
to relate, they conjoin their wickedness with 
their religion, and by this means destroy the 
action of conscience, and thus become wholly 
deprived of all perceptions of right, given over 
to hardness of heart, and abandoned of God. In 
this state, with the power of reason destroyed, 
the passions lashed into wild and untamable fury, 



SPIRITUALISM. 201 

-without restraint, they sow to the wind, while 
hurrying on to their places among the damned, 
to reap the whirlwind. 

" Fraternally yours, B. F. Hatch. 

"Providence, E. I, NoTiember^ 1861." 

THE TESTIMONY OF MR. J. F. WHITING-. 

Mr. Whiting was for some time a very promi- 
nent spiritualist in the city of ISTew York, and 
was one of the getters up and chief supporters 
of what are known as. the " Broadway Eooms," 
for the propagation of Spiritualism. After wit- 
nessing its immoral tendencies for some time he 
abandoned it. 

The letter is addressed to Dr. Hatch, and, to 
some extent, confirms his statements. 

" Dear Sir, — Tour letter, dated Providence, 
E. I., May 28th, 1860, is before me, requesting 
me to give you some facts relative to the evil 
effects of modern Spiritualism. My time is so 
much occupied with business matters that I 
have very little opportimity to interest myself 



202 SPIRITUALISM. 

upon the subject, or to draw legitimate con- 
clusions as to its terrible and damning results 
upon its believers, especially its mediums. It is 
hardly necessary for me to give you any facts 
relating to such a topic. Your lengthened and 
extensive experience among the better classes 
and more enlightened circles of spiritualists 
has given you great opportunities to see the 
rascality and sin which the majority of its be- 
lievers have been addicted to. We have the 
fact daily spread before us in the public journals 
throughout the country of the fruits of Spiritual- 
ism ; and there is hardly a town or village in 
the land but can produce plenty of facts demon- 
strating the damning tendency and ruinous con- 
sequences which arise from this forbidden inter- 
course with spirits. 

^'I look upon modern Spiritualism as the 
work of Satan, and which has created more sin 
and iniquity since its introduction through the 
Fox family than all other crimes and vices dur- 
iog the last fifty years. In short, from what 
experience I have with Spiritualism and its 



SPIRITUALISM. 203 

believers, I am firmly convinced that the result 
of Spiritualism is, as I have said before, wholly 
immoral and debasing ; destroying all the moral 
character of its believers, inculcating as it does 
false principles, and raising false hopes, thereby 
rendering man little better than the brute crea- 
tion. Adultery, fornication, deception, and 
hypocrisy are its leading tendencies. The 
spirits assume the garb of angels, while in 
fact they are but devils doomed by sin on 
earth, and seek through Spiritualism to in- 
crease their power in hell by converts from 
the earth. 

" I have known many spiritual mediums, and 
I am free to confess that I hardly ever found 
one who on a thorough examination could stand 
the test of truth, virtue, or honesty. They fail 
either in one or the other of these traits of char- 
acter. I am deeply impressed with the fact 
that modern Spiritualism is the work of spirits ; 
but they are evil ones, and I can see no good 
resulting from holding communion with them. 

" Tours very truly, J. F. Whitikg." 



204 SPIRITUALISM. 

We conclude these testimonials against Spir- 
itualism with one from the very heart of the 
spiritualistic ranks. This, I trust, will be ac- 
ceptable to spiritualists, although dealing a 
heavier blow against it for its practical cor- 
ruptions than any we have introduced. 

THE TESTIMONY OF MRS. CORA L. V. HATCH. 

Mrs. Hatch is one of the most popular me- 
diums to be found among spiritualists. Seeing 
the corrupting influence of the system upon the 
polluted infidel hordes who embrace it, she 
makes a bold attempt at reforming them. A 
hopeless task ! 

In a lecture delivered in 'New York city, 
January 19, 1862, entitled "Spiritualism, its 
Theory and Practice," she says : 

"There is no doubt that the shaft which 
Spiritualism has sunk has struck the vein ot 
that floating population in the United States 
and other countries, of which we have spoken 
in terms which are no less applicable to their 



SPIKITUALISM. 205 

mental and spiritual than to their political 
status. They form a class who have never 
believed in anything, but are ready to adopt 
any form of belief, as occasion may require, 
from orthodox Christianity down to the latest 
ism. They are the aids and reliance of the 
radical reformers, the destructives, who tear 
down old edifices indiscriminately, and put up 
nothing in their stead. They considered them- 
selves commissioned to reform the world. 
They decry Christianity, and all other supports 
of law and order recognized by society. They 
have been ready to seize upon any new doc- 
trine, and it is not at all surprising that Spirit- 
ualism, which presents such an admirable cover 
for their designs, should have attracted many of 
these characters, and that in their hands it has 
become one of the most preposterous systems, 
both as to theory and practice, ever brought 
before the community. . . 

" Thus it happens that we have as advocates 
of Spiritualism all the offscourings of society in 
a new shape. We have the ci-devant apostles 



206 SPIRITUALISM. 

of Mormonism, Fourierism, and every other 
' reform ' movement whicli nobody has cared to 
adopt ; and when the world recognizes these as 
leaders in our ranks it stands aghast and says, 
^Why, these are the old nuisances revived. 
This Spiritualism is but another name for that 
which leads to immorality, and the tearing 
down of all that is dear and sacred in our insti- 
tutions. It opposes Christianity, and even seeks 
to violate the sanctity of the fireside ;' and we 
are sorry to state that the conduct of those in 
general who profess to be spiritualists confirms 
this judgment, and society has too good ground 
for complaint and apprehension. It must be so 
from what we have stated. . . . The general 
tendencies of Spiritualism have been not to 
elevate but degrade its disciples in the moral 
and social scale, to break down all barriers 
which have been considered essential to a well- 
ordered community, and destroy every altar 
and shrine to which their rites and sacrifices 
could not be admitted. Each member of the 
class to which we refer seizes hold of Spiritual- 



SPIRITUALISM. 207 

ism witli tlie same idea — that lie or she is to be 
made the savior of humanity by its means. 
Every broken-down politician or expelled church- 
member seeks to engraft upon it his own auda- 
cious speculations, and to make spirits respons- 
ible for what he dare not openly advocate in 
his own person. ... If you have any doubt 
of this you have but to look abroad over the 
land." 

Spiritualists have stoutly denied that the 
fruits of the system are as described by Mrs. 
Hatch, but that they were paragons of moral 
purity. Let it be remembered that many of 
the persons described by Mr. H. are among 
the chief supporters of the system. A " new 
dispensation" which produces such fruits in 
the short space of ten or fifteen years must be 
regarded as satanic. But Mrs. Hatch con- 
tinues : 

"In the first place, spiritualists have gener- 
ally the reputation of being impure, atheistical ; 



208 SPIRITUALISM. 

everything, in short, that is improper and unsafe. 
There is usually some ground for opinions so 
wide-spread. . . . 

" With these facts hefore ns, it is not surpris- 
ing that many, after becoming acquainted with 
it, should have withdrawn from all recognition 
of it, and refused to countenance a system which 
is ignominy to those who have advocated it. . . . 
"With sorrow we say it, many are the families 
which have been desolated by it. • . . Many 
thousands are the hearts and minds which have 
been broken and overthrown through this fatal 
delusion. . . . Further than this, we might 
dwell on the practices of professed spiritual- 
ists, but we have said enough." 

These denunciations do not come from the 
opponents of Spiritualism, but from one of its 
warmest advocates. Mrs. Hatch has been be- 
hind the curtain, where she has seen a part of 
what has been hid from public gaze. 

Not content with one lecture on the subject, 
she renews the attack, in the same place, 



SPIRITUALISM. 209 

January 26^, 1862. On this occasion she 

says: 

" The Church and Society are turned against 
Spiritualism. . . . because of the unholy, de- 
basing effects to which it has been led. Cut 
where it may, the truth is that it is the charac- 
ter of too many of its prominent advocates 
which rendered Spiritualism unpopular. It has 
become a cloak for all debasing acts ; a vehicle 
for all the dangerous theories that the brain 
of man, prompted by an evil spirit, has ever in- 
vented ; we have become responsible for them 
all ; and at last we are made to incite or justify 
every crime of the decalogue, and have become 
the confederates in every scheme of imposture 
which can lead to notoriety or gain. Thousands 
have been led to do what they knew to be 
wrong, because they have been assured that 
spirits desired it. . . . Broken-down physicians, 
briefless lawyers, placeless politicians, who have 
always been dependent upon their wives' rela- 
tions or their own friends, go about the counti7 

14 



210 SPIRITUALISM. 

as mediums, spiritual doctors, lecturers, etc., 
literally sponging their substance out of honest, 
hard-working people. Go to the smallest coun- 
try town, and if you take interest enough to 
stay there a few days some person of this sort 
comes around, who seeks in some form to cause 
the people to believe that he is not the veriest 
impostor and scoundrel out of jail." 

Here is a portrait of Spiritualism by one who 
is not supposed to represent it worse than it is. 
These " sweeping denunciations " of Mrs. Hatch 
do not seem to please Miss Emma Harding. 
"Writing from 'New York to the " Banner of 
Light," March 1, 1862, she says : 

" I believe we can none of us afford to con- 
demn each other too loudly, lest we should be 
inviting a criticism we cannot endure." And yet 
she confesses that there are sufficient grounds for 
some of the charges. Perhaps the remark of 
Miss Harding, with regard to " inviting a criti- 
cism," etc., was intended as a thrust at Mrs. 



SPIKITUALISM. 211 

Hatch, whom Spiritualism had led to violate her 
own marriage vow, and separate from the one 
to whom she promised before God to " keep 
herself" so long as they both shonld live. 
But Mrs. Hatch can no more reform the ad- 
vocates of Spiritualism than she can convince a 
Christian community that the system is of God. 
It is simply the work of devils, and a stream 
does not rise above its fountain. " "Wicked men 
and seducers wax worse and worse, deceiving 
and being deceived." 

In conclusion, Spiritualism is attempting to 
popularize those social conditions of society, 
which are to be deeply deplored by every good 
citizen. ^' Iniquities which have justly received 
the condemnation of centuries are openly up- 
held ; vices which would destroy every whole- 
some regulation of society are crowned as vir- 
tues ;" and prostitution, the bane of domestic 
peace, is upheld and encouraged. 

How timely is the wise man's counsel, " Re- 
gard not them that have familiar spirits, neither 



212 SPIRITUALISM, 

seek after wizards." "' Let not thine heart in* 
dine to their ways ; go not astray in their paths. 
Their house is the way to hell, going down to 
the chambers of death." " The dead are there 
and their gnests are in the depths of hell." 
Prov. yii, 25-27; ix, 18. 



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